The UNL Department of Mathematics is a national leader with respect to offering opportunities for professional growth for math teachers. For the Fall 2022 semester, the department is offering two online courses that have been designed with teachers and the work they do teaching mathematics in mind.
Over the past 15 years, more than 450 math teachers have earned their master’s degree, making UNL a true leader with respect to providing opportunities for mathematics teachers. The fall semester starts Monday, August 22, 2022. If you have taken a course in the past year at UNL, use the instructions here for how to enroll in MyRED: http://registrar.unl.edu/registration-procedures. If it has been longer than three semesters, please email Lindsay Augustyn at laugustyn2@unl.edu for further instructions.
#1 - Math 808T, section 700: Concepts of Calculus for Middle-level Teachers
Class Number for Registration: 18489
Students in this course will develop conceptual knowledge of the processes of differentiation and integration, an understanding of their applications and an understanding of the relationship between the two processes. Topics will include average and instantaneous rates of change, slopes of tangent lines, limits, derivatives, extrema, derivatives of polynomials and exponential functions, anti-derivatives, areas, integrals and the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus. Emphasis is placed on conceptual understanding and connections to the middle level curriculum. This course serves to introduce the basic concepts of calculus to middle level teachers and is designed around a series of explorations through which students are led to discover the main ideas of calculus. Thus, problems sets which guide participants through concrete examples conveying the fundamental concepts of calculus will form the basis of the course. The primary goal is to help teachers develop a fundamental understanding of the key mathematical ideas in calculus in order to broaden their mathematical perspective and gain insight into the topics in middle level curriculum which are related and foundational to its development. Graphing calculator strongly recommended (TI 84 and above). This course has been successfully taught to teachers of grades 5-8 as part of the Math in the Middle program.
#2 - Math 811T, section 700: Functions for High School Teachers
Class Number for Registration: 18490
A study of functions in the pre-calculus, high school mathematics curriculum from an advanced viewpoint. Functions will be investigated by examining their utility in more advanced courses and applications, enabling teachers to better understand the important aspects and appropriate emphasis of a concept. Content will include polynomial, circular (trig), and exponential functions, and their connections to calculus.
Note: The Department of Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education is offering TEAC 836G Professional Development: Mathematics Leadership this fall online as well, with Christine Olsen. The section number is 700 and the Class Nbr is 10080.
All of these courses are online asynchronous, and each will cost approximately $1,200.