Bruce Interview, Fall 2010

Little by Little, the newsletter of the Department of Mathematics at the University of Florida, Volume 21, Issue 1, Fall 2010 

Little Review: In the past, we have seen advertisements from The Teaching Company for things like economics, the early history of Christianity, art history and so on. The course that you were commissioned to develop in the publicity materials mentions an audience including students taking AP calculus in high school. Is The Teaching Company trying to broaden its audience from older adults? 

Edwards: Yes, my course is one of their first attempts to broaden the market. Up to now, the Teaching Company courses have appealed to “educated adults” and “life-long learners.” Now they are interested in producing courses for folks who want to see the “nuts and bolts” of a college course. My calculus course is very similar to a college first semester calculus class, or an AP high school calculus class. 

Little Review: We are pleased that the company chose you as a means to broaden their market. Do you think that your materials might be used by high school students to augment what they are learning in the class or would this be used in place of taking a course from a high school teacher? 

Edwards: I think these materials could be used to augment, but not replace a high school or college calculus course. All the major topics of the AB Advanced Placement program are covered, so a student can see appropriate examples and explanations. The materials might also be of interest to calculus teachers looking for different ways to explain a concept. 

Little Review: Given the national scope of The Teaching Company, we are curious as to how they came to link up with you to undertake this project. 

Edwards: That’s an interesting question. I don’t know how they got my name, but one day I received a call asking if a representative of the Teaching Company could sit in on my class. He said he would be in Gainesville observing a few courses, including my large lecture second semester calculus course. I said “sure,” and didn’t think much more about it. He sat in the front row, taped my lecture on infinite series, and left for another class.  A few weeks later, I was surprised to receive a call from the Teaching Company asking if I would be interested in taping a sample lecture at their studio in Washington, D.C. At the time (Fall, 2007) I was busy with some other company stuff. 

Little Review: For many years, we have noticed half page advertisements appearing in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal for courses in a wide variety of fields with DVDs of noted university and college teachers lecturing on subjects of interest to a broad audience. In an advertisement for a course on “The Art and Craft of Mathematical Problem Solving,” by a Professor of Mathematics at the University of San Francisco, the Teaching Company writes that they “review hundreds of top-rated professors from America’s best colleges and universities each year. From this extraordinary group we choose only those rated highest by panels of our customers. Fewer than 10% of these world-class scholars are selected to make The Great Courses. We’ve been doing this since 1990, producing more than 3,000 hours of material in modern and ancient history, philosophy, literature, fine arts, the sciences, and mathematics for intelligent, engaged adult lifelong learners.” 

Edwards: Now this enterprise seems to be broadening its reach and our own long-time UF Mathematics faculty member Distinguished Alumni Professor Bruce Edwards was selected to produce a course Understanding Calculus: Problems, Solutions, and Tips, which is appropriate for not only the first semester of a college course in calculus, but also suitable for studying all the topics covered in a full year of AP calculus in high school at the AB level. This 36-DVD set, which consists of lectures of 30 minutes each, was released this past spring semester, 2010 projects, and I had to say no. They contacted me again over the summer, 2008 and asked if I would be interested in a calculus project. I was intrigued, and said yes, despite my fears on filming in front of a camera (actually two!). So I flew to Washington in September and gave a sample half-hour lecture on prime numbers. They must have liked my style, because I was offered a contract for the calculus course. I went to Washington for two weeks in July, 2009 for the actual taping (4 lectures a day for 9 days). Fortunately, my calculus textbook editors gave me permission to base the content of the course on our calculus textbook (with Ron Larson, Cengage Publishing). The finished DVD course (36 lectures on DVD and workbook) finally appeared in March, 2010. 

Little Review: That is fascinating, that their representative heard you teach infinite series! Tell us a bit more about how the lecturing before the cameras went. Did you write on a chalkboard, use transparencies, or what? 

Edwards: Lecturing before the two cameras was very unnatural for me. You have to keep watching the little red light so as to face the correct camera. There is no audience, and hence no feedback from students. And sadly, no chalkboard or transparencies. While talking I had to look at my PowerPoints, which were displayed under the cameras. For a given half-hour lecture I would prepare about 25–35 PowerPoints. Some had just a few words, like “discuss the tangent line problem,” some had equations, and others had graphs. I had to verbally go through the equations as if they were appearing on a blackboard. The folks at the Teaching Company then edited my lectures by adding the equations below my face, or on the side. They also produced high quality graphics. 

Little Review: Did you do any practice lecturing sessions with The Teaching Company prior to the July 2009 taping in Washington? 

Edwards: No, there were no practice sessions (other than the sample lecture I delivered many months before taping the calculus course). I arrived in Washington on Sunday, August 9th, and began taping August 10th. We taped four lectures a day for 9 days. be used to augment, but not replace a high school or college calculus course. All the major topics of the AB Advanced Placement program are covered, so a student can see appropriate examples and explanations. The materials might also be of interest to calculus teachers looking for different ways to explain a concept. 

Little Review: Given the national scope of The Teaching Company, we are curious as to how they came to link up with you to undertake this project. 

Edwards: That’s an interesting question. I don’t know how they got my name, but one day I received a call asking if a representative of the Teaching Company could sit in on my class. He said displayed under the cameras. For a given half-hour lecture I would prepare about 25–35 PowerPoints. Some had just a few words, like “discuss the tangent line problem,” some had equations, and others had graphs. I had to verbally go through the equations as if they were appearing on a blackboard. The folks at the Teaching Company then edited my lectures by adding the equations below my face, or on the side. They also produced high quality graphics. 

Little Review: Did you do any practice lecturing sessions with The Teaching Company prior to the July 2009 taping in Washington? 

Edwards: No, there were no practice sessions (other than the sample lecture I delivered many months before taping the calculus course). I arrived in Washington on Sunday, August 9th, and began taping August 10th. We taped four lectures a day for 9 days. A typical day was 4 hours, either in the morning or afternoon. 

Little Review: Thank you for enlightening us as to how your course came to fruition and we especially hope that the materials will be useful in improving the AP high school experience. Interestingly enough, after we had concluded the e-mail exchanges back and forth with Professor Edwards which resulted in this article, the New York Times on Wednesday, April 7, 2010 ran one of the half page advertisements for Edwards’ own course, headed “Learn ways to approach and solve the fundamental problems of this mathematical field with 36 richly illustrated lectures delivered by an award-winning professor.”