Viewing Earth From Space
Students calculate various facts about the earth as seen from space.
Mortality and Money
Suppose you are going to start a life insurance company in which you will insure 1000 young people, who are 16 years ol…
The 1992 Election... Mathematics?
When reporting the results of a survey, the organization usually gives the sample percentage as an estimate of the actu…
Eco-Powered Programs: Linear Programming in Environmental Issues
United States decision makers continue to wrestle with problems of natural resources, ecology, and human needs. In ord…
Tim & Tom's Financial Adventure
Tim and Tom are interesting characters. Their story has been told millions of times and has appeared many times in pri…
For Earthlings, Eccentricity is 0.01673
As a citizen of Planet Earth, you can be called an Earthling. For the purpose of cosmic communications, you can be ide…
Time, Money, & Polynomials
As time passes, money and polynomials make more money. How could this be? Do this HiMAP Pull-Out and you will learn ho…
Card Shuffling, Card Tricks, and Mathematics
Professor Peter Diaconis of Harvard has discovered that seven shuffles are required to mix a deck of 52 cards thorough…
How Logical Are You?
How logical are people in general? To find out, number a piece of paper from 1 to 10 and answer the questions in the f…
Examining Applied Rational Functions
Rational functions occur in amazing places. They even occur in the area of comparing the fuel costs for automobiles. S…
Making Money With Algebra
Many individuals make money by collecting interest on money which they loan or invest. Banks and other financial insti…
Examining a Lifetime of Automobile Purchase Expenses
Young families often feel the need for financial planning for the future and for saving to finance such items as emerg…
Time and Motion Study
You are a new Industrial Engineering Technician, working for Bates Manufacturing. The marketing department has decided…
The Long View Calculating What You'll Need in Order to Retire
Perhaps as a student you are now 16, 18, or 20 years of age. It may be that some day you will begin your earning years…
Earthquakes and Logarithms
One thinks of an earthquake as a sudden motion or trembling in the earth caused by an abrupt release of accumulated en…
Apples, Oranges, and Interest Rates
How many times have you heard the expression, Don't compare apples and oranges? I'm sure that your mathematics teacher…
The Rise and Fall of the Individual Batting Average
Yes, it is that time of the year again - the start of the major league baseball season! Every April ignites that annua…
Geometry and Roof Framing
The primary function of a roof is to protect the house and occupants from weather. Roof construction should be strong t…
Testing for Steroid Use: When Can You Save Money by Pooling Samples?
The activities in this issue's Pull-Out explore the question, "When can you expect to save money by pooling two steroi…
Alcohol and Your Body
This lesson presents a mathematical model of how alcohol is eliminated from the body. The mathematical focus is on gra…
Mathematics and the Apollo 11 Flight to the Moon
On a summer day in 1969, America launched a new adventure in space. Apollo 11 blasted off into orbit around Earth at 1…
A Mathematical Model of a National Economy
An interesting area of applied mathematics is the field of economics. In macroeconomics, models of a national economy…
Mathematical Modeling and Dynamical Systems
The theory of dynamical systems is applied to problems in many disciplines. Let's take a specific example from biology…
Mathematics and the City Water Tower
Many cities store water in towers and from these towers they run water through pipes into houses, stores, and factorie…
The Super Apple Collider
The following is a revision of a classic story that has been told to millions of students. A hunter at point A aims hi…
Polling Pitfalls
In 1936, the famous magazine Literary Digest, distributed over 10 million mail-in ballots to assess voter preference f…
The Mathematics of Bond Pricing and Interest Rate Risk
According to the Securities Industry Association, investors lost one trillion dollars in bonds in 1994. The total loss…
Buying a Car, Now or Later
An interesting activity for high-school mathematics scholars is to find, correct, and analyze errors. Much of mathemat…
A PERT Answer
Have you ever been involved in a project where it seems like there are a million things to do and they all depend on o…
The Monte Carlo Method and Random Number Generators
From The New York Times: "Monte Carlo Simulation, named for Monaco's famous gambling casino, can help to represent ver…
Geometry While You Wait
Have you ever waited at the gas pump while filling your gas tank? Did you pass the time by fiddling with the gas-tank…
Mathematics and the Stock Market
Why do people invest in stocks? It's obvious - to make money. Many Americans realize that it is their responsibility to…
The Wandering Sunset
Doesn't the sun always set due west on the horizon? Actually, the sun sets in the west only on two days of each year: a…
Latitude and Longitude
The question of one's exact location on the face of the earth has intrigued humankind for thousands of years. Location…