Additional Fun:
Questions:
- Even if simple interest does not appear in the curriculum, would you still utilize it in order to make a direct comparison between linear and exponential growth?
- Do you show the entire curve to begin with, or would you build up as in the 3 pictures given in the prompt?
Further examples of exponential growth:
a. My Geogebra Applet on Bacterial Growth.
b. Nrich Task – Modelling an Epidemic (Nice kinaesthetic starter). You could also have an interesting discussion about how gossip could be modelled very simply with exponential growth.
c. Grains of Rice on a Chessboard Problem (The video is quite old but I love it).
d. Towers of Hanoi Puzzle (NCTM Applet)
e. Paper Folding TED Talk.
f. Dan Meyer’s Domino SkyScraper.
g. Human Population through Time (exceptional video on population growth shared by @atulruna on twitter)
h. How often do real world phenomena actually follow exponential growth indefinitely?
Dan Pearcy 