Examples Of How Symbolic, Hand Held Calculators Have Changed The Way We Teach Engineering Mathematics

Since the 1999 fall semester, the TI-92 Plus or the TI-89 (scientific calculators with symbolic computation capabilities) has been compulsory for all full-time students entering our engineering school. The introduction of this hand-held technology has forced us to re-assess our goals and explore new approaches in teaching mathematics. In this paper, we will present innovative uses of the TI-92 Plus/89 that relate to our calculus and differential equations courses. We will give examples of presentations taken from our lectures that illustrate how they have changed since the mandatory introduction of these calculators. We will also give examples of questions that we use to assess our students’ understanding of the material.