Maple Application in Economic Disciplines

Abstract

Purpose of the article Efforts to use the Internet to make everyday activities as easy as possible is a current trend. The same applies to education, with teaching being gradually more and more supported by programs, applications and internet documents. The same goes for teaching of subjects in the filed of mathematics and economics and their applications.

Methodology/methods One way to bring mathematics closer to students and encourage their creativity is the use of tools provided by ICT technologies. The use of ICT in teaching of mathematical and economic subjects has now come to the centre of attention of educators teaching these subjects.

Engagement of computers and all ICT technologies in the teaching process may be of various quality and form. We can perceive the computer as a tool the educator uses to prepare their teaching aids, as well as the environment where the whole class works on solving a particular problem.

Scientific aim The aim is the use of Maple for solving differential equations, difference equations, functional differential equations and their economic applications.

Findings Incorporation of mathematical software (Maple, Matlab, Mathematica, …) can simplify work with functions created from real data for students. Students can get new motivation for work when they see that mathematics is not only a theoretical science but it can also be used as a tool in many fields. Studies show that students using Maple handle the curriculum content much better than those who learn in the traditional way. Improvement is obvious in all students regardless of initial knowledge level.

Conclusions By suitable and active incorporation of Maple into teaching a much larger amount of examples can be discussed since a number of routine calculations are eliminated. Maple allows students to model various economic situations and see immediately how these changes of external conditions affect the output. Many tasks stimulate critical mathematical thinking since it forces outcome estimates or checks and, last but not least, there are graphical outputs.