The Use of Symbols: A Case Study by Leonard Gillman, is the appendix to Gillman’s booklet Writing Mathematics Well: A Manual for Authors, published by the MAA in 1987. Gillman writes, “In this appendix, I take a symbol-laden article and show how it can be drastically simplified…one can appreciate the simplification even without keeping track of the mathematical details.”
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This assignment from the second week of Real Analysis (Fall 2009) prods students to think rigorously. It includes questions requiring students to translate notation and to learn to LaTeX a table. Developed by the 18.100C team, especially Joel Lewis and Craig Desjardins.
Read more →This worksheet is about how changing the order of quantifiers changes the meaning of a mathematical statement. It was created by Todd Kemp and modified by Kyle Ormsby for M.I.T.’s communication-intensive offering of Real Analysis.
Read more →The logic exercises in this assignment require students to translate between formal notation and conceptual language, to learn to LaTeX a table, and to include a figure in a LaTeX document. The assignment is from the second week of M.I.T.’s communication-intensive offering of Real Analysis. It was developed by the 18.100C team, especially Todd Kemp and Joel Lewis.
Read more →Choosing appropriate notation is an important aspect of mathematical communication. Notation should be simple be memorable conform to conventions Information about using notation in mathematics is presented in the following resources: Leonard Gillman’s “The Use of Symbols: A Case Study,” Writing Mathematics Well: A Manual for Authors, The MAA, 1987, pp 37-44. A case study of how to simplify the notation in a symbol-laden article. Atish Bagchi and Charles Wells’ “On the Communication of Mathematical Reasoning,” PRIMUS vol. 8, pages 15-27 (1998). This article addresses conventions and pitfalls related to various aspects of notation and wording. Eric Schechter’s “Common Errors
Read more →Context: This lesson plan is from a weekly communication recitation that accompanies M.I.T.’s Real Analysis (18.100C). This week students learn about countability and metric spaces (Rudin pp. 24-35). Likely trouble spots for students at this point in the term are negation, multiple quantifiers, abstractness of metric spaces, and “higher infinity.” Authors: The recitation was developed primarily by Todd Kemp. Communication objectives: Translating among mathematical concepts, mathematical language, and notation. Making tables and including figures in LaTeX. Recitation & Assignment: Most of the recitation is devoted to working in small groups on a worksheet on order of quantifiers. Other brief topics
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