VIII. Short Papers. You will be required to write three short papers. The deadlines associated with these papers can be found in Section XIV. Your papers must be typed and should be approximately 3 double-spaced pages in length. You may leave spaces for mathematical formulae, and then fill these in by hand. Each paper will be submitted in two rounds. In the first round, you are to hand in two copies with your name not appearing on either copy. Please do not put these into fancy folders; a simple staple in the upper left corner will suffice. I will have you fill out a short form that will enable me to keep track of all of these unidentified papers. Also, by signing that form you will be stating that you have not violated the Academic Honesty Code by plagiarism (see Section XVI and the attachment on Academic Honesty from the General Catalog -- only the hard-copy handed out in class has this attachment).

In the class after the initial versions are submitted, I will redistribute those papers to be peer-reviewed (see Section IX). Those reviews (or critiques) should be completed and returned to me two classes later. In the following class, I will return the papers to their authors together with the accompanying critiques, at which time you should begin working on preparing a final version of your paper. Your final version (together with the original two copies of the initial version) is due two classes after the initial version is handed back to the class. The schedule for all three papers is laid out in Section XIV. Note that initial drafts of the second and third papers are due one week after final drafts of the first and second papers, respectively; you will need to manage your time carefully and be "thinking ahead" in the early and middle parts of the course.

Paper 1. This paper will be a brief biography of some mathematician. I will give you the name of your mathematician on Tuesday, September 3, together with suggestions on various resources that you can use to gather the information from which you will write your report. The biography should include information about the education and background of your mathematician, his or her contributions to mathematics (and any other fields), and any other items of interest (e.g., anecdotes) that you can find. Please note that this assignment will make you the class expert on your mathematician, and you may be asked to share your knowledge with the class when your mathematician's name is mentioned.

Paper 2. To write the second paper, you must first monitor an e-mail mailing list on the history of mathematics (math-history-list) hosted by the Mathematics Association of America. There are two ways to do this. You can add your e-mail account to the mailing list - if you decide to do this, you should go ahead and subscribe to the list immediately (it's free). From your e-mail account send a message to: majordomo@maa.org In the body of the message type the single line (and only the single line): subscribe math-history-list You should shortly receive a return e-mail message telling you that you are now subscribed to the list. (Be sure to save the "Welcome to math-history-list" message, as this tells you how to eventually remove yourself from the list. Alternatively, you can use a web browser such as Netscape to access the math-history-list archives which are automatically kept up to date; the URL is http://forum.swarthmore.edu/math.history/ With either of these methods, you can listen in on mathematicians as they discuss various aspects of the history of mathematics such as new books and interesting journal articles on the subject, how to teach history of mathematics, how to use history in the classroom, and questions and answers (and debates) about various unsettled issues. Keep in mind that this mailing list is a tool used every day by working mathematicians around the world; you should not be making posts to this list. After you have "eavesdropped" for a while on this mailing group, you will be ready to write your second paper. The topic may be on any posting (or collection of postings) you have read from this list. You are to explain what interested you about the posting(s), and what you learned from it (or them). The best papers will also follow-up on these postings by comparing their content to other information sources available to you (e.g., your text, other books in the library, Internet archives, etc.). If you use the math-history-list archives and want to write about postings made prior to August 22, 1996, you must have your topic approved in advance by me. If you subscribe to the mailing list, you may remain subscribed after this assignment is finished (if you find the exchanges interesting), or you may "cancel your subscription" by following the directions that came in your "Welcome to math-history-list" message. (As a courtesy to Prof. Rickey who maintains this list, you should remove yourself from the list before you lose your e-mail account.)

Paper 3. The third paper should describe how you would go about incorporating some aspect of the history of mathematics into a high-school level mathematics class. For the purpose of writing this assignment you should think of yourself as a mathematics teacher. Some questions to ask yourself while you are trying to decide what you are going to write about (and to ask yourself while you are writing the paper) are does the history really enhance understanding of the material (and if so, how?), can it be presented in an understandable fashion, can it be covered in a reasonable amount of time, etc. If the circumstances warrant it, I may allow some papers to address using history of mathematics in a mathematics class taught at a higher or lower level than high school; you will need to discuss this with me.

IX. Critiques. Part of each of the three short paper assignments, will be reading and commenting on two initial versions of papers written by your classmates. I will provide you with guidelines for writing such critiques when I distribute the papers for you to read. Your reports will be transmitted (anonymously) to the authors who will use your comments and criticisms in preparing their final drafts.

X. Classroom Procedure. Most of the presentations will be given by your fellow classmates. They will probably be a little nervous about speaking in front of you, just as you may feel a little nervous during your presentation. Please treat them with the same respect that you would like to receive when it is your turn to give a presentation. On the other hand, if the presenter (and this certainly includes me) says something that you don't understand, you should not hesitate to ask a question.

XI. How To Reach Me. You will need to make several appointments to see me this semester to discuss your in-class presentation and term paper. The two best ways of reaching me (besides coming to my office during my office hours) are by e-mail and by telephone; the address/number is given on the first page of this syllabus.

XII. Research Resources. I have put (and will be putting) some books on reserve at the CSUSM library. You are encouraged also to look through the stacks (try QA21-QA31), but please return books as soon as you no longer have a need for them so that they will be there for your classmates. I will produce and maintain a Web page for this course. The URL is http://www.csusm.edu/public/DJBarskyWebs/330page.html. You can also reach it from the San Marcos home page (http://www.csusm.edu) by going to CSUSM CWIS (the whole thing) [near the top of the page], then to Faculty [under Personal Home Pages, near the bottom of the page], then to David Barsky [about the third screen down], and finally to MATH 330 Introduction to the History of Mathematics [about the second screen down]. My Math 330 page will serve as a repository for official course announcements such as reading assignments, homework assignments and summaries of the class presentations. You are strongly encouraged to use this page as an entry point for accessing a number of on-line archives, including the math-history-list archives.

XIII. Writing Resources. You should make use of the Writing Center (Craven Hall, 3106 G&H; phone 750-4168) - it opens for the semester on Tuesday, September 3. This university facility exists to help you improve your writing skills. It is recommended that you obtain an appointment (each appointment is thirty minutes), but they do also take walk-ins on a first-come basis as time permits.

For the journals and the short papers, you can go to this center at any stage in the writing process: with nothing but the instructions for the assignment, with the collection of notes that you have taken, with a rough draft, or with a more polished draft. For the critiques, you must have already written a draft before you can take your assignment to the Writing Center.

XIV. Important Dates. Mark these on your calendar.