Introduction to scientific research: research experiences for undergraduates

A course for research experiences for undergraduates in mathematics is described. The classroom environment is nontraditional in the sense that formal lectures, group discussions, brainstorming sessions, and structured computer demonstrations are used. The course is structured so that it is self-contained and requires students to have basic programming skills and calculus. The use of symbolic computational languages, such as Maple, allows students early in their academic career to explore many different types of models analytically as well as numerically. The course is centered around communications, task sets, and the development of knowledge sets. Oral and written communication is developed through completion of three PowerPoint presentations, a poster, and a research paper composed using LATEX. To keep the students focused, task sets are used to ensure the students are always making progress. The knowledge sets are used to shape the content for the course. This course can be easily altered to develop a research course in any field by altering the knowledge sets. Suggestions are presented for changes in the knowledge sets for control research.