Peer Review

World of Mathematics--Animations and Interactive Applets

Material Detail page

Reviewed:: Jun 15, 2002 by Mathematics

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Ratings

Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:: This is a sub-page of the large and comprehensive Eric Weisstein's World of Mathematics site that is separately reviewed elsewhere on MERLOT. At the time of review it listed links to 143 animated GIF movies and to 964 live interactive Java applets powered by LiveGraphics 3D.

Please see the related reviews of the href="http://www.merlot.org/artifact/PeerReviewDetail.po?rOid=1010000000000059477">main
World of Mathematics site, the href="http://www.merlot.org/artifact/PeerReviewDetail.po?rOid=1010000000000059486">World
of Mathematics-Probability and Statistics subsite, and the href="http://www.merlot.org/./artifact/PeerReviewDetail.po?prOid=1010000000000059490">World
of Mathematics-Recreational Mathematics subsite.
Type of Material:: Collection of animated GIFs and interactive Java applets.
Recommended Uses:: This material is best used to encourage visual experimentation and understanding.
Technical Requirements:: Basic browser. Java-enabled browsers will be able to use LiveGraphics3D applets; those that are not will display static images. Animations are animated GIF?s and do not use Java.
Identify Major Learning Goals:: This material encourages visual experimentation and understanding.
Target Student Population:: Math students at many levels or instructors looking for visually appealing supplementary material. Many of the animations and applets deal with more advanced mathematical topics.
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: Minimal background in algebra and geometry would enhance most demonstrations.

Content Quality

Rating:
Strengths:: This is an extremely large collection of animated and interactive material ranging from simple to more sophisticated. Animated GIFs include such examples as 120-cell, Cardioid, Mobius Strip, and Reuleaux Triangle. Interactive applets include such examples as Corkscrew surface, Hypercube, 16-cell, Fresnel's Elasticity Surface and Klein Bottle. Some examples have excellent algebra explanations and links to definitions and reference materials
Concerns:: More explanation of the actual geometry or equations that underlie the changing visual display would be useful for more advanced users.

Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching Tool

Rating:
Strengths:: This page will be effective for the student wishing to have access to a large collection of visual images that allow a variety of interactions such as rotation, zoom and changing the axis of rotation. Some of the algebra explanations of equations in Cartesian and Polar format should be useful for two-year college students.
Concerns:: Much of the material is at the advanced topic level, suitable for undergraduate and graduate math majors.
Initially apparent interactivity is simply the ability to start and stop rotation withbrief instructions contained in the status bar at the bottom of the browser window. Other interactions require obscure key and mouse combinations. Detailed instructions for those are available at http://mathworld.wolfram.com/live.html or from a navigational tab at the top of the complete list of animations page, but they are not cross-linked from individual animation pages.

Ease of Use for Both Students and Faculty

Rating:
Strengths:: Simple viewing of these animations is generally easy.
Concerns:: In order to take advantage of the range of possible interactivity, the user must find the detailed instructions for Live 3D graphics; providing specific instructions on locating the navigational tab link to Live Graphics at the top of the Animated Graphics (Interactive Illustrations) page would be helpful.

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