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EXPERIMENTS FOR NUMERICAL METHODS

An attempt to develop low cost, low space, low setup time experiments has been made.  Read the following paper to find out how the experiments are being implemented in the classroom.  Assessment results of including the experiments in the class at USF will be available in September 2008 and will be presented at the 2008 FIE Conference (links will be added at the time of availability). 

The Length of a Curve: This experiment illustrates the difference in using curve fitting with polynomial interpolants and spline interpolants. 

To the student: A handout is given to the students that gives the background information on the experiment, how to collect the data, and exercises that need to solved.

To the Instructor: Do you want to put this experiment together for your class? Find out to see what materials you need to buy, where you can buy the materials, and how much it costs.

Topics Covered: Interpolation and Integration

Strains in a Loaded Truss: This experiment illustrates the use of simultaneous linear equations in finding the forces in the members of a truss. 

To the student: A handout is given to the students that gives the background information on the experiment, how to collect the data, and exercises that need to solved.

To the Instructor: Do you want to put this experiment together for your class? Find out to see what materials you need to buy, where you can buy the materials, see engineering drawings, and how much it costs. (COMING SOON)

Topics Covered: Simultaneous Linear Equations

Cooling a Aluminum Cylinder in Iced Water: This experiment illustrates several key concepts of numerical methods, mainly regression to find physical constants from collected date. 

To the student: A handout is given to the students that gives the background information on the experiment, how to collect the data, and exercises that need to solved.

To the Instructor: Do you want to put this experiment together for your class? Find out to see what materials you need to buy, where you can buy the materials, see engineering drawings, and how much it costs. (COMING SOON)

Topics Covered: Regression, Nonlinear Equations, Integration, Ordinary Differential Equations, Differentiation

'To the student: A handout is given to the students that gives the background information on the experiment, how to collect the data, and exercises that need to solved.

To the Instructor: Do you want to put this experiment together for your class? Find out to see what materials you need to buy, where you can buy the materials, see engineering drawings, and how much it costs. (COMING SOON)

Topics Covered: Regression, Integration

Hold Your Water in a Champagne Glass:

This experiment illustrates several key concepts of numerical methods, mainly spline interpolation and integration. 

To the student: A handout is given to the students that gives the background information on the experiment, how to collect the data, and exercises that need to solved.

To the Instructor: Do you want to put this experiment together for your class? Find out to see what materials you need to buy, where you can buy the materials, and how much it costs.

Topics Covered: Interpolation, Integration

Copyrights: University of South Florida, 4202 E Fowler Ave, Tampa, FL 33620-5350. All Rights Reserved. Questions, suggestions or comments, contact kaw@eng.usf.edu  This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant# 0126793, 0341468 and 0717624.  Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.  Other sponsors include Maple, MathCAD, USF, FAMU and MSOE.