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Education & Academic

Liberal Arts, Meet Computation A Wolfram Community Introduction

We can guess if you’re reading the Wolfram Blog that you’re probably a Wolfram Language user, whether as a recreational programmer, a physics professor or a high-powered data scientist. And let’s be honest about another thing: if you’re using it to solve algebraic integrals or analyze SARS-CoV-2 genetic sequences or some other complex subject, you’re likely a big-brained person. I mean, you’re investigating the very nature of the universe in all its facets, right?
Mark Long, Senior Technical Communications Manager, Outreach & Communications
Education & Academic

A New Method of Bell Ringing Using Mathematica to Discover Wolf Wrap

English bell ringing (called change ringing) has many connections to mathematics, notably to group theory and Hamiltonian cycles. My wife, Joan Hutchinson, is an ardent bell ringer (having rung in both England and North America), and I knew the basics of this ancient craft. A recent puzzle book by Mark Davies [1] inspired me to bring Mathematica’s integer-linear programming (ILP) capabilities to bear, but I wanted to go beyond puzzles and develop a new ringing method that would be of interest to the bell-ringing community.
Stan Wagon, Guest Author
Current Events & History

Change Your Perspective on the History of Mathematics with These Eight Learning Journeys

Amid COVID’s first wave, I had the privilege to join forces with Eric Weisstein and his team at Wolfram Research to create the History of Mathematics Project, a virtual interactive gallery highlighting physical artifacts that are important to the history of mathematics, for the National Museum of Mathematics (MoMath) in New York City. Most of my mandatory confinement at home was spent navigating through online collections from world-class museums, locating outstanding mathematical artifacts and creating interactive and computational explanations for them.
Bernat Espigulé-Pons, OSW Operations
Education & Academic

Easter Eggs in Plain Sight, Climate Change Challenges and Knitted Images: Wolfram Community Highlights

Wolfram Community is our favorite, continually growing forum to share and show support for projects using the Wolfram Language, connect with other Mathematica aficionados and find solutions for coding questions. It's also a great platform for sharing computational innovations that can benefit your local community—or beyond. We've collected some of the exciting ways Wolfram Community members have been giving back through Wolfram technology—check them out!

Chapin Langenheim, Editor & Web Project Coordinator, Project Management
Education & Academic

The Computational Classroom: Easy Ways to Introduce Computational Thinking into Your Lessons

A version of this post was originally published on the Tech-Based Teaching blog as “Computational Lesson-Planning: Easy Ways to Introduce Computational Thinking into Your Lessons.” Tech-Based Teaching explores the intersections between computational thinking, edtech and learning. Sometimes a syllabus is set in stone. You’ve got to cover X, Y and Z, and no amount of reworking or shifting assignments around can change that. Other factors can play a role too: limited time, limited resources or even a bit of nervousness at trying something new. But what if you’d like to introduce some new ideas into your lessons—ideas like digital citizenship or computational thinking? Introducing computational thinking to fields that are not traditionally part of STEM can sometimes be a challenge, so feel free to share this journey with your children's teachers, friends and colleagues.
Jesika Brooks, Blog Editor - EduTech, Outreach & Communications
Current Events & History

Martian Commutes and Werewolf Teeth: Using Wolfram|Alpha for Writing Research

This post was initially published on Tech-Based Teaching, a blog about computational thinking, educational technology and the spaces in between. Rather than prioritizing a single discipline, Tech-Based Teaching aims to show how edtech can cultivate learning for all students. Past posts have explored the value of writing in math class, the whys and hows of distant reading and the role of tech in libraries. It’s November, also known as National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). This annual celebration of all things writerly is the perfect excuse for would-be authors to sit down and start writing. For educators and librarians, NaNoWriMo is a great time to weave creative writing into curricula, be it through short fiction activities, campus groups or library meet-ups. During NaNoWriMo, authors are typically categorized into two distinct types: pantsers, who “write by the seat of their pants,” and plotters, who are meticulous in their planning. While plotters are likely writing from preplanned outlines, pantsers may need some inspiration. That’s where Wolfram|Alpha comes in handy.
Jesika Brooks, Blog Editor - EduTech, Outreach & Communications