1. Spreadsheets in Liberal Arts Mathematics Gisela Ahlbrandt Eastern Michigan University

2. Advantages over a graphing calculator  Cheaper, lab use is free  Spreadsheets are used in the “real” world,  Output is nicer and can be printed,  More intuitive  More powerful, easy change of parameters

3. Disadvantage wrt a graphing calculator  Not available in regular classroom,  Takes more time to learn,  Has so many features that it can feel overwhelming for a student  More work for the instructor to learn

4. The Course: Mth110  Terminal Math course, 3 credit hours,  Satisfies the general education requirement to prepare students to read the news paper, quantitative reasoning, elementary probability and statistics.  Text: For All Practical Purposes, COMAP

5. The Students  Have usually no math requirement in their program of studies, should have one year of Algebra.  Large variations in background.  Many did not like math in school and resent that they have to take a course at all, many have never learnt basic concepts, many lack number sense.  Definitely a challenge to teach.

6. Excel Unit  Comprises about 20% of the course  5 lab meetings and discussions in class before and after the labs  Lab projects, term papers.

7. Organization  Prepare the labs in the regular class room, do some hand computations,  Buddy-Pairs to spread computer expertise  Detailed lab instructions, I go through the lab and help students individually.

8. Levels of Use  1. Students use prepared worksheets  2. Students set up worksheet with detailed instructions  3. Students develop their own worksheet to solve a problem  4. Students write a term paper/report: set up a worksheet to solve a problem, create tables and graphs from computations, import the results into a text document.

9. Problems  Computer lab hard-ware problems  Software problems: compatibility, no money for latest versions, Mac versus PC, missing macros  No knowledgeable lab assistants

10. Examples of Projects  Credit Card Finance Charges  Million Dollar Prize  Minimum Wage over Time

11. http://www.emunix.emich.edu/~gisela/