How to Incorporate the History of Mathematics into Secondary Classrooms

Abstract

Students learn mathematics better when they are excited about the subject and engaged during class time. One way to promote student engagement in math classes is to teach topics in the context they were discovered. In this presentation, several topics included in middle school and high school math curriculum will be shared in their historical context. Topics include the Pythagorean brotherhood, the controversy of the number zero and irrational numbers, how algebra originated, the debates on calculus, China and India’s contributions, and how symbols were developed to represent numbers.