Population Activity

I really like the Random Sampling activity. I can definitely use it to teach about sampling methods. The International Population module is a very interesting tool. I will be using it when I create my lesson plan for this class. I will have students choose a country and then find two data points generated by the model. Students will then create an exponential model from those two points. Students will then create a data set of at 6 points. They will then use MS Excel to create an exponential curve to fit the model.

I did notice that in some countries, the population model began to decrease at some point in time. If a student chooses a country whose population model changes from increasing to decreasing, then they will be encouraged to look into the concept of logistic growth as opposed to simple exponential growth.

The Lesson of Kaibab was very interesting to me. It showed how much impact we can have when we try to impact nature without considering the long term consequences.

Every class in our building is required to have reading and writing components. It is often difficult to find interesting things to read and write about in a math course. These population links provide many resources for me to tie reading and writing to mathematics as they allow me to assign questions beginning with "Why...."