Getting Serious About Mathematical Fun
0Day 3 | 5:00 PM–5:30 PM
"Getting Serious About Mathematical Fun"
Presented by:
Eliza Gallagher, Clemson University, Clemson SC USA
Neil Calkin, Clemson University, Clemson SC USA
https://qubeshub.org/community/groups/simiode/expo/2025
Abstract: In teaching mathematics, we all too often lose sight of what brought many of us into mathematics in the first place: how much fun it can be! A significant portion of current mathematicians first got hooked by mathematical puzzles by Martin Gardner and others. For the past several years we have been teaching an undergraduate course on mathematical puzzles. In this talk, we discuss research supporting a puzzles-based approach, pedagogical and logistical aspects of implementation, and some of the elegant mathematics that can be embedded in variant sudoku, which replaces given digits by mathematical constraints in sudoku. We also discuss outcomes for student engagement and ongoing research into assessment of puzzle similarity and mathematical reasoning through puzzles. We are actively seeking collaborators for ongoing research in this area.