It was the first day of a brand new semester. I walked into the lecture hall right at 11:00 AM, only to watch my students shuffle in looking like zombies. Their eyes practically screamed, 'This is a killer course. I just want to survive and walk away with a C-minus."
And I get it.
This is the exact same batch of students who survived my Ordinary Differential Equations (ODE) class. They thought they had seen it all. Derivatives flying everywhere, integrals haunting their dreams. But today? Today we were stepping into a whole new dimension, which is the Partial Differential Equations (PDEs).
Observing the way they walked into the hall, I knew I had to make them understand that PDEs are a completely different beast. So, for the first lecture, I decided to throw out the syllabus, ditch the lecture notes entirely, and commit a crime against traditional academia: I made them move. A lot.😂
Activity 1: The 12 PM Pizza
What is the ultimate universal language at noon? Calculus? Physics?
No. It is pizza.
Before talking about single variables or boring definitions, I forced.. I mean, gently persuaded my hungry students to talk about a piping-hot pizza fresh out of the oven. At 12 noon, nothing else is more appealing.
Why pizza? Because heat distribution is the classic gateway drug to understanding PDEs!
We talked about how heat spreads across the crust. It is not just changing over time t. It is changing across different spots on the pizza (x and y). Boom. Just like that, multivariable chaos replaced single-variable comfort.
Looking at this, the only variable I care about right now is extra cheese. 😋
Activity 2: The Human Guitar String
Next up, I requested 10 volunteers to lend their hands and dignity to science. I asked them to stand up and pretend to be a vibrating guitar string. They weren't just students anymore, they were the living, breathing graph of a function.
Space (x): We looked at how different parts of the string moved left and right.
Time (t): We watched how the whole shape rippled and shifted as time ticked on.
Imagine ten university students wiggling in sync, trying to represent mathematical waves. It looked less like a classroom and more interpretative dance class, but guess what? It clicked.
By the time class ended, the vibe in the room had completely flipped. The "I'm going to fail" panic had melted into actual laughter and curiosity. PDEs sound terrifying, but at their core, they describe the real world. How waves ripple, how heat travels, and how fluid flows.
I reminded them that they don't need a heavy textbook to grasp that. They just need a little imagination, some imaginary pizza, and a willingness to look ridiculous with their classmates. 😁
If my students learned anything today, I hope it’s this. Math isn't just a monster to survive. Sometimes, it's a guitar string, sometimes it's pizza, and most of the time, it's way more fun than you think.
A lot of mathematics is involved in generating this beautifully.
We get to carefully play around with the function U=U(x,y,t).
Until then, wish me luck for the next 14 weeks of lectures, I totally need it! See you next time. Bye! 💕
