Professor
Department of Mathematical Sciences
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA
575-646-2723, 575-646-1064 (FAX)
davidp@nmsu.edu
At the Hopf Topology Archive you will find preprints of some of my research papers in algebraic topology.
I have extensive web material on Teaching with Original Historical Sources in Mathematics, which includes versions of quite a number of my joint publications in this area.Classroom teaching methods for
active student work in class via
advance reading, writing, and warmup exercises, as alternatives to
lecture:
Here are thoughts about the classroom
dynamics of teaching this way. Here is an explanation of my grading
and daily logistics of handling several units simultaneously with
these assignment parts. Here are sample homework
guidelines
for students about how assignments can be designed to foster an active
classroom without lecture. Here is an overview
handout for a sophomore discrete mathematics course of how I present
this pedagogy to students. Here are example
assignments for courses in discrete mathematics and calculus,
showing reading questions, warmup exercises, and final exercises. Here
is an
actual assignment
handout for students, showing the different things I expect them to
do.
Translations of primary historical
source materials:
Excerpts
on the Euler-Maclaurin summation formula, from Institutiones Calculi
Differentialis
by
Leonhard
Euler (pdf format), or in (dvi
format).
Excerpt from a letter of Monsieur Lame to Monsieur Liouville on the question: Given a convex polygon, in how many ways can one partition it into triangles by mean of diagonals?: Lame's elegant geometric solution to finding the one step recursion relation solving Euler's decomposition problem, leading to the factorial formula for Catalan numbers.
Some more papers:
OK, here's a photo
taken at the 1999 Boulder conference on homotopy theory. On the
left
is Italian algebraic topologist Luciano Lomonaco, on the right is me.
You might find another photo of me playing badminton
at NMSU.
