Competències

Competència Matemàtica, en ciència, tecnologia i enginyeria

Competència personal, social i aprendre a aprendre

Competència en consciència i expressions culturals

Activitat

Agnesi Curve representations

Personatges:

Tema: Elementary functions

Competències

Competència Matemàtica, en ciència, tecnologia i enginyeria

Competència personal, social i aprendre a aprendre

Competència en consciència i expressions culturals

Matèries i cursos per Sistema Educatiu

Espanya, Matemàtiques, 4t(B) ESO, Sentit algebraic

Espanya, Matemàtiques, 4t(B) ESO, Sentit socioafectiu

Enunciat

Observacions i context

- It is suggested to work on questions 1 and 2 with the whole group, instead of individually.

- Alternatively, we can tell students how this curve was mistranslated as "the witch of Agnesi" instead of "Agnesi’s curve" and explore what connotations or motivations there could be behind that mistranslation (by a man) of one of the best texts on mathematics at the time, written by a woman.  

- Some of Maria Gaetana Agnesi's forerunners in mathematics, philosophy and astronomy are Theano of Crotone (c. 546 BC - c. 450 BC), Hypatia of Alexandria (c. 370 – c. 416) and, in the early modern period, Sophia Brahe (1556-1643), Maria Cunitz (1610-1664), and Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia  (1646 -1684).  

- Some of her contemporaries were renowned scientists such as Margaretha Kirch (1703-1744), astronomer; Faustina Pignatelli Carafa (1705-1785), physicist and mathematician; Émilie du Châtelet (1706-1749), mathematician, physicist and philosopher; Laura Maria Catharina Bassi (1711-1778), scientist, poet, and philosopher; Angelique-Marguerite le Boursier du Coudray (1712-1794), midwife; Dorothea Christiane Leporin (1715-1762), doctor; Anna Morandi Manzolini (1716-1774), anatomist; Marie-Geneviève-Charlotte Thiroux d’Arconville (1720-1805), chemist, anatomist, and biologist; María Juana Rosa Andresa Casamayor de la Coma (1720-1780), mathematician; Nicole-Reine de la Brière Lepaute (1723-1788), astronomer; Marie Anne Victoire Pigeon (1724-1767), mathematician, or Maria Angela Ardinghelli (1728-1825), mathematician and physicist, among others.

- Other relevant scientists in the 18th century were Maria Christina Bruhn (1732-1808), chemist and inventor; Claudine Picardet (1735-1820), chemist, mineralogist and meteorologist; Jeanne Baret (1740-1807), botanist and explorer; Caroline Lucrecia Herschel (1750-1848), astronomer; Marie-Anne Pierrette Paulze (1758-1836), chemist; and Sophie Germain (1776-1831), mathematician and physicist.

Descripció

In this activity, there are three graphs representing different witches of Agnesi. The idea is that students learn the common aspects of these graphs so that they can come to a generalisation of its equation from particular cases and, in the end, that students draw a representation of the witch.

Resposta

Documents