Possibly OT request for suggestions

I teach math and computer science at a high school in Kentucky. Next 
year, I'm teaching a course for students who have had the equivalent of 
one year of college computer science (intro to programming and data 
structures) and I've decided that I'd like to do a software engineering 
by example course in which the class works on a big multi-faceted 
project of some sort.

After considering different possibilities for projects, I've decided 
that we should do a math tutor. That way the students will get 
experience with coding what they already know how to do algebraically, 
there should be some interesting database issues for keeping track of 
student progress, graphics for visualizing functions, parsing problems, 
etc.

Obviously, all of this hinges on the ability to make math look good on 
the screen for the prospective tutee.

I've pretty much decided that we should attempt to manipulate MathML 
(or objects that instantiate structure much like MathML) within the 
program, but I'm a little at a loss as to how we should visualize 
stuff. We'll be writing the program in Java, and I'm not sure if we 
should try to go from visual markup to graphical representation, with 
the understanding that we'll get from semantic markup to visual 
representation somehow, or if we should try to go straight from 
semantic markup to graphical representation.

I'd hoped that there was an open source Java project already doing 
something like this, but Google isn't turning up much.

Would someone with some more perspective on MathML, math typography, 
and possible suggestions about what to try and what to avoid be willing 
to have a short conversation with me about my options, either on-list 
or off?

I have about 2.5 months before school starts up again, and I'd like to 
make sure that I'm not planning anything impossible.

Thanks,
Todd O'Bryan

Received on Tuesday, 3 June 2003 22:29:09 UTC