
The above is a copy of Don's watercolor painting of The
Nautilus shell; it is Don's logo. The shell is beautiful, its shape a mathematical curve,
and can be obtained from Shell World, at
seashellworld. Also see the equation for the shell ,
making
a spiral , IES
java applet making a Nautilus, Xah
Lee's work on spirals (and other curves) and student work
on the growth of the Nautilus (chapter 6), and comparing the Spirals of the Nautilus
shell, the Fibonacci numbers, and the Equal Tempered Chromatic Music Scale .
ようこそ; WELCOME
! عَلَى
الرُّحْبِ
والسَّعَة ;
환영받는;
¡bienvenido a casa!;
迎;
karibu!; aa'o bhagat karna;
Willkommen; Aapka swagat hai; kumusta,..and all the world.
Refreshing insights into the learning and
doing of some important mathematics, by young people (while doing lots
of arithmetic, using many hands-on materials, science to
math activities, and the non-trivial use of calculators and computers)-- for
children, as well as adults.
Don assumes only that a student can count.
Don's keys:
visualization,
look for patterns,
learn to learn!
To
order Don's
books and CD's on his secure order form
Try sample
problems from Don's books,
by chapter!
The Math Program
Excellent math instruction for all ages, and all
abilities - for 32
years!
Prepare your child for Fall classes this
Summer! It's a great help.
Don Cohen 217.356.4761
Jerry Glynn 217.328.1640
Exciting
news- all the time!
From Mr. Sasaki at Kodansha Ltd., a month
after they published the Japanese translation of Don's book Calculus By and
For Young People (ages 7, yes 7 and up) in 1998: "We
can say that your method was accepted to Japanese people as a kind of new text
in which they could learn and understand math much more than ever before".
27 June 2008 Mom
and Dad with their 6 children,
drove down from North of
Chicago. Mom
and 4
children, 3 girls and 1 boy, worked with Don for 2
hours, while Dad and their
two youngest children went off to the park. Click here
to see what they worked on.
17
June 2008 Don received this
thank you note from Paul, who came to Don from
3rd grade through
12th grade:
Dear Mr. Cohen,
Thank you very much
for the beautiful graduation card, the gift card to Pages For all Ages, and for
attending graduation. Even more significantly, thank you for
providing a strong foundation in mathematics and for helping me through subjects
I found especially difficult. Your innovative approaches and teaching styles
kept math interesting and fun, while the teaching methods in school made it dull
and repetitive. This approach has been something that I can apply to different
aspects of my life, by looking at a topic from a different angle, I am able to
much more thoroughly comprehend the subject.
Once again, thank you so much for all you've done.
Sincerely,
Paul
Thank you Paul, for
your dedication to excellence and being a wonderful human being, and to Mom and
Dad, for making it all possible! You all have helped make the last 10 years of my
teaching very enjoyable.
16-21 June
2008 Nanako
came from Japan again to work with Don!
22
May 2008 From Elizabeth in
Rock Island, IL,
after her 2 days observing, working with some students, and studying with Don:
"Dear Don and Marilyn, Thank you both so much for your generous hospitality during my visit. I am so excited to get to work on the workbook and also to show my children what I have learned. I believe that children need to see their parents learning,
too..".
Elizabeth, it was wonderful that you
could come to Champaign, leave your family behind, meet some of my parents and
work with some of my students. You did very well, had some fine ideas that we
share, and even figured out the area and perimeter of the snowflake curve, using
infinite series- not an simple task! Elizabeth
plans to return with her 6 yo daughter in August.
3 May 2008 Don
& Marilyn were in Albany, NY to accept his 2008 Excellence in Education
award- see the program and Don
after his speech .
Don
wants to thank the Alumni Association of UAlbany, SUNY, his friends, students and parents of his students who wrote to
support his nomination. Don realizes though, that this award is not as important
as his work with individual students over the years-and for that he is most
grateful. It has been a great ride!
While in Albany,
he and Marilyn drove past Bethlehem Central Junior High School (now Middle
School) where Don started his math-teaching career in 1954!
April 2008 Margaret,
an 8th grader, asks a great question!
15
March 2008 Jonty
and George are returning to work with Don from MN in August, like last summer!
Don's latest
release: a two-disk CD ROM set,
"Calculus For Young People
(2 CD set)",
ISBN 9780977949311,
containing
all
of Don’s materials -3 books, 2 videos, map, & poster, listed here:
1. "Calculus By and For Young People (ages 7, yes 7 and
up)”
2. "Calculus By and For Young People--Worksheets"
3. "A Map to Calculus"-- a 15" x 18"
flowchart
, overview
4. Video #1 "Infinite Series By and For 6 year-olds and up"
5. Video #2 "Iteration to Infinite Sequences with 6 to 11 year-olds"
6. "Changing Shapes With Matrices"
7. “On thinking About and Doing Mathematics”-11x14” poster
The two-disk CD ROM
set above, sells
for $64.95 +
$6 s&h-
for
PC and Mac users.
Besides the
two-disk CD set above,
Don will continue to sell these items
on his order form:
"Calculus By and For Young People (ages 7, yes 7 and up)"
(CD-ROM);
ISBN 9780977949304
__________________ $17.95
"Calculus By and For Young People--Worksheets"
(CD-ROM);
ISBN 9780962167478
________________________$29.95
"A Map to Calculus"-- a 15" x 18" poster-flowchart;
ISBN
9780962167485_________________________ $7.95
"Changing
Shapes With Matrices" (paper);
ISBN
9780962167430
_________________________$9.95
See what Rainbow
Resource Center says about Don's materials.
1 January 2008
What
a way to start the new year! Don spoke to Jonathan (now
26 years old)
and his Mom and Dad who are in CT. Jonathan, at age 7, started
working in Don's book Calculus By and For Young People (ages 7, yes 7 and
up), with his Mom acting as his secretary. She sent his work to Don.
(This started Don on his Math
By Mail/Email Program). That
and the following summer, his Dad brought him to Champaign for a week to work
with Don. Some of Jonathan's work is in Don's worksheet book and
he is on his videotapes.
Jonathan has finished the
course work for his
PH.D. in High Energy Physics and is working on his
dissertation, which he plans to finish next year!
Don is very pleased when his
students do well!
What a
wonderful year 2007 has been. If we could only have Peace, and no one should go
hungry!
2
8
December
2007:
Don
and his wife Marilyn celebrated their 55th
wedding anniversary today!
Marilyn and
Don Cohen are excited about their part-time work as Shaklee Distributors and
users of many Shaklee
“in harmony with nature”
products-100% guaranteed -nutritional supplements including the new VITALIZER, Get Clean, Cinch
inch-loss program, air purifier and more!- and they want to share these with
you. Please take a look at their Shaklee
website if you want to feel better, want a healthy home, a healthy planet, and
bring in some extra money.
27
December
2007:
Marie,
one of Don's students for about 3 years (~1980
in HS), stopped in to talk.
She lives in Baton Rouge, LA. She was in Champaign to help her brother get his
house ready for sale and has applied to Wolfram Research Inc. for a job. What a
nice surprise!
One
summer when Marie was Don's student, he asked her to help him teach youngsters
at Mt. Olive Baptist Church in Champaign. She did a fine job. Don still hears
from former students in that summer class. Marie has kept in touch as she went
on to graduate UI (with her Mom!), a Math major & Physics minor. Then went
to work for Delco in IN, She got an EE degree at NC A&T State U, then her MBA
at Tulane in 2006 She worked for Dow Chemical in LA and the United Way and
Motorola in Champaign, now at Caterpillar in Peoria.
In
2006 she
was going to Tulane U in New Orleans, cramming for exams, when her Dad called to
tell her Katrina was on the way and she should IMMEDIATELY leave and come home to
Champaign. She made it out, but lost everything, including Don's painting he had
given her. Don gave her a new painting this day and his 2-disc CD set.
27
December
2007:
Kelly
W. needed to pass her Algebra 2 class with at least a 76 to get into a
School of Nursing at Barnes Hospital in St. Louis. She came to work with Don for
2 hours December 22, especially on partial fractions. She called this day to
thank Don and tell him she got an 80 on the online test and was accepted into
the School of Nursing! What a nice way to end the year!!
19
December
2007: Tara
T creates an infinite series
that Don hadn't thought of before!
17
December
2007:
Fábio
from Brazil purchased
Don's books. He asked Don
to do an email interview which is in Portuguese
on
a blog for students of Physics.
11 December
2007:
See
Erin
K's work
on infinite series + ( during Summer after 3rd grade and Fall in
4th grade)- she did something Don had not expected, and it made him work also!
27
November
2007:
Don received this email from Lori Johnson
Morse:
"Hi
Don, how’s it going? You wont believe this: R.K. wants to bring
his daughter to Kansas City [from Tennessee] for a week for the math program!
He wants to work 4-5 hours a day. If we can get this all worked out she
will be my first to travel from another state.
He linked to our site from yours. THANK YOU!"
Don
is pleased to recommend Lori; she and her husband Joe came to Champaign to
study with Don a couple of years ago and their math program has flourished since
then! Go Lori!!
24 November
2007:
Don's son Brian made a
beautiful, wooden 3-D diorama for the story written by Don's granddaughter Tara,
for
her UNI HS geometry class, at age 15, entitled A
Quest For The Sacred Golden Pineapple, Pine Cone and Artichoke. The diorama
includes 1.) a figurine of The Old Mathman holding a golden pineapple, made by
Tara, within a dome, 2.) a watercolor painting by Tara and Don of The Old Mathman's house in the
woods, and 3). a shelf underneath with a copy of Tara's story.
19&20
October
2007:
Rachael worked with Don during her high school years. As a junior in a western University she returned during the summer
of 2007 and returned again in October to work on an assessment test she needs to
take for college algebra . What a nice surprise! [She did well!!]
19
July
2007:
Don
received this email from a parent who had purchased his 2-disc CD set:
"..I just wanted to say thank you again for inspiring me and helping me
realize that kids can understand and do so much more with math than many
people are willing to believe..".
8
July
2007:
Don
saw Khaki for the first
time in about 17 years, having worked with her and her 2 brothers for many years.
Khaki has a son almost 4 yo and another child on the way. She will be teaching 6th grade
math next year; Khaki has Don's worksheet book and plans to use it with her
class!
Above
photo is from the back cover of Don's worksheet book: Don, with Khaki at age 17,
used the computer program Derive to "zoom
in" on a curve to find the slope of the tangent at a point on the curve,
leading to the derivative. She was preparing for her Fall calculus class (see ch.
14).
13
June
2007:
Lori's
Mom called to tell Don that Lori got into UNI High School and would continue to
work with Don in August when she returns to Champaign- Congratulations Lori!!
Don's
secure order form
22 March 2007: Jamie,
an 8th grader, solves
the quadratic equation x2
- x - 1 = 0 by iteration.
18 March 2007: "Hi Don, I am a college Maths teacher in the United Kingdom
and I am currently working on trying to develop the idea of linking the Maths
curriculum to real life examples where-ever possible. I have been looking at
your website - example materials on the web, it looks great and was wondering
whether it would be possible for me to purchase your 2 disc set about calculus
for young people even though I am in England".- K.W., UK
Of course, and she did!
3 March 2007: Geometric
Sequences and the 88 Keys on a Piano by
Don
26 February 2007:
An
exciting day! John Melby, Emeritus
Professor of Music at UI, who had moved to Mass. with his wife Jane Thompson a
few years ago, dropped by to see Don and Marilyn.
He came back for the premier of his computer composition at The Krannert Center,
UI. Don had his daughter Kirsten from 4
years old, maybe through 10th grade at UNI high. She just graduated with an M.A. from Munich U. in
Germany. She is fluent in German and Italian, speaks some Thai, and will be studying Chinese soon.
Don
had his son Charles from 5th-9th grade, also a UNI graduate. Charles received an
A.B. in Physics from Princeton (Magna cum Laude) in 2006, just received an M.Sc. in Mathematics
(with distinction) from Oxford in
England, on a scholarship, and in 2007 is
in a Ph.D. program in Physics at UC
Berkeley. Would you say Dad was proud!!??
(and Don also!)
After
Don congratulated Charles by email, on
27 March
he wrote back:
Hi, Mr. Cohen!
It's great to hear from you. How have things
been? It looks like you're
still at it, teaching math to the next generation!
That's fantastic, it's great
that there's someone who is still working hard to
show how fun math can be.
Incidentally,
my dissertation
was actually in... the theory of groups!
Which, of course, I first encountered when you
explained symmetries of the square to me. I hope you've had some other
students who
have taken a look at those same ideas, they're
interesting ones and ones that kids are perfectly capable of handling if
explained properly (as you do).
Best, Charles
17 February 2007 Five
views of Don's Math Room - where it
all happens!
9 February 2007
Don received an order for his 2-disc CD ROM set from
Moscow, Russia !!
7
February 2007
Don spoke to Loralee
Johnson at "4 Your Mind" and told people during the interview that Loralee is selling Don's materials in Edmonton,
Alberta, Canada and can be reached at 1-780-485-0969 or ljohnson@shaw.ca
2 January 2007 Don received an order
for his 2-disc CD-ROM set from the begabtenakademie for gifted students ages
5-15, in Germany! Don sent this order with a copy of some pages from the German
translation of his book "Calculus By and For Young People (ages 7, yes 7
and up)". This is exciting..we'll see what happens from here!
From Bernd, the teacher in Germany, a month
later:
"..
I've only started with the infinite series 1/2 + 1/4, ... with 3 groups: a group
of 5-year-olds (8 Pupils) , a group of second graders (7-8 years; 13 pupils) and
a mixed math group form grades 1 - 4 (12 pupils).
I
called the lessons "Chocolate maths" because I like to use everyday
things and in this case I bought some quadrilateral bars of chocolate of the
brand "Ritter" which are 4x4 shaped.
Fractions
are taught in grade 6 in Germany. Everything was really quite new for the
children. Time by time I'm going to try your other
suggestions and ideas..." Don was very
pleased that his materials are being used in other countries.
Check
out
Lori's website for her "MathHead Tutoring Inc."
“..You wrote an amazing book. Every
week what my kids learn puts smiles on their faces. It makes me smile, too.
You make people smile because they can understand math better. It’s a gift and
you share it with as many people as you can! And I am having a blast following
in your footsteps. Much, much thanks!
Lori”
.
KC,
MO
See the
internet links to Don's website and references to his books from around
the world!
Homeschooling math by Don Cohen
“ ..Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”
From The Road Not Taken
by
Robert Frost. Don feels that what he has done is not the usual, and something
that has touched many people, young and old, around the world, very positively, and
has been very rewarding- and that has made all the difference in his life!
To get around on Don's site,
choose from the menu below:
About
Don's materials
(7 items) and how they are used
.
Especially see the write-up about Don's materials
on
the
Rainbow
Resource
Center
website and
where Don's books are sold around the world!!
New discoveries,
new student work
and
Don's new pages:
Margaret,
an 8th grader, asks a great question!; Tara
T creates an infinite series
that Don hadn't thought of before!; See Erin
K's work on infinite series - she did something Don had not expected, and it
made him work also!;
Nanako
changes a graph without changing the equation-HOW!?;
Katy finds the area under a sine wave from 0 to Pi
(after Archimedes);
Donna, a 4th
grader, graphs a circle, then changes the equation!!!;
2 ways to
rotate a triangle 90° CW - by Alvaro, Ian & Don;
Using
trig to do rotations with matrices;
Don
paints in watercolor with.. +
+
+
Have your
daughter/son study with Don,
here
in Champaign, IL. Don has stopped working with students from afar on IM
with
voice. He
worked
with 50
year-
old
Tim, an M.D. from
FL
for over a year;
he worked with 10 yo Tadeo from
Argentina;
7 yo Erin, from
ID,
for 5 mos;
a Juku teacher in Japan
came
for the month of September 2003
to study with Don. Grace,
then a 6th grader in Chicago, worked with Don using Email for about a
year, and came here twice.
Don worked
with
3
students from afar during the AY '06-'07,
but
without voice.
About
Don's teaching - Sample problems, new student work, patterns in
mathematics, the non-trivial use of calculators & computers,
beginning
trig, ..
About
Don's books in Japanese
:
as of 21
July
2006,
25,860 copies
of the Japanese translation of Don's book "Calculus By and For Young People (ages 7, yes 7 and
up)" were sold by Kodansha Ltd. in 6 1/3 years!! and 8,012 copies of
Don's book "Changing Shapes With Matrices" were sold by Kodansha Ltd.
in the first 2 yrs., 8 months!
Patterns in
Mathematics (patterns in numbers,
patterns in graphs,
patterns in shapes,..) and how Don's students work on particular
topics.
Don's
secure order form
About
Don's website - see the four or so Java applets at IES in Japan using
Don's ideas, like
showing
the 6 trig functions on one diagram and
the new Java applet by IES on
Don's website
at "Changing
Shapes With Matrices" .
Don's Materials
Will Teach You
To: |
Discover
Patterns
-New discoveries &
Patterns in Mathematics
|
 |
Try sample problems from Don's worksheet book,
by
chapter!
Don's Materials
(all published and copyrighted by
Don Cohen-The Mathman)
-
Book: "Calculus By and For
Young People (ages 7, yes 7 and up)" (CD-ROM)
- Worksheet book:
"Calculus By and For Young People - Worksheets"
(CD-ROM)
&
Table of Contents of books 1 & 2
- Videotape #1: "Infinite
Series"
- Videotape #2: "Iteration"
- "A Map to Calculus"
-
"Changing Shapes with
Matrices"
- All
of Don's
materials
are on a 2 disk CD set (see
above)
Science to math activities
The non-trivial
use of Calculators and Computers in Don's materials
The important mathematics
The
importance of guessing
Patterns in
Mathematics
To order
Don's materials
|
 |
Visualize
Mathematics |
Learn
to
Learn -
Tessa at 5 works with Grandpa
! "When Grandma talks, everyone listens!" |
 |
What parents,
teachers, kids, Martin Gardner, Morris Klein, W.W. Sawyer, the MAA, the
ASCD, Kodansha, Mary
Pride in her 'Big Book of Home Learning', the July/Aug. 2000 issue
of The Home Education Magazine, The Math Forum..
say about Don's materials
On Thinking About and
Doing Mathematics
Who was that
Mathman?
'The Math Program'- Don and Jerry's great
way of teaching math & loving it!
(and
what parents and students say about The Math Program)
How
other sites use Don's ideas & his website
Don's Favorite Places on the WWW
Puzzles,
Games, & Hands-On Activities Don Uses With Students
After 45 years of teaching math &
parenting..
Links to this
website- how many now ?
Don's materials are for grades K-12, ages 6-8 with adult help, up
through pre-calculus students, adults, teachers, teachers of teachers, and
parents! |
Send
email
to Don Cohen concerning his 'Math by Mail/Email' with IM
and video,
coming to Champaign to work with him
, ways he could improve his web site, or other issues.
people have come in, peeked, glanced, shook, were curious, skeptical, impressed,
excited, thought about what their children are doing in school
or as homeschooled, tried a problem,
solved a problem, emailed Don, called Don, ordered his material, .. since June
6, 1996. Notice, this site slipped past 200,000
visitors in early 2004- in less than 8 years!
Thank you for stopping, do try some problems before you
go!
Don's
web site was designed and started by one of his former students, Jennifer,
while at MIT, and continued & maintained by Don, with some help from his
grandson, Lian.