Charting Life’s Ups and Downs Mathematically
For three decades, longtime Upper School math teacher Liz Flemming Hon. 1689 has been guiding students through a unique and introspective project she calls “My Life as a Sine Curve.” Originally offered as an extra credit opportunity during the 1994-95 school year, the project has since become a staple of Flemming’s curriculum, providing juniors in her Advanced Pre-calculus class a deep dive into both mathematics and self-reflection.
The inspiration for this project was Flemming’s former student, Michael McDonald OPC ’92, who died by suicide during his junior year of college. This tragedy prompted Flemming to think of a way to encourage her students to reflect on their lives in a meaningful way through the lens of a mathematics curriculum. “My Life as a Sine Curve” was born.
Reflecting Flemming’s love of math and commitment to her students, this interdisciplinary project equips students with the technical math skills to graph a series of connected sine, or cosine, curves. Students begin before Thanksgiving break, embarking on a journey of self-discovery by interviewing their families to gather more information about their early childhood experiences. They then create a map that charts the ups and downs, the highs and lows of their lives. From this visual, they create 20 to 40 sinusoidal equations that accurately coincide with their life's trajectory. This process prompts them to consider: “What mathematical steps do I take to ensure the graph matches a visual representation of my life?”
In addition to the mathematical component, students write a summary paper sharing stories from their lives that inspired their graph's trajectory, as well as what they've learned about the math that is integral to the project. More importantly, they are encouraged to use this paper as a reflective piece on their life journey thus far.
For the last component of the project, students create posters that are displayed in the Upper School hallway. Their graphs and equations are bordered by poems, drawings and/or pictures, making each project as unique as the individual presenting it. And while the graphs used to be hand-drawn, more recently students have used the graphing software Desmos to help check their equations and better display their graphs.
This school year marks 30 years of “My Life as a Sine Curve” for Flemming and her students. “After all these years of assigning the project, I am always awed by the students trusting me with their stories and reflections,” Flemming said. “I am impressed with how much math they learn, but even more about how much they learn about themselves and the perspective they gain. It’s heartwarming to read their concluding paragraphs, in addition to learning about the thrill of a new puppy or the heartbreak of moving away from a close friend.”
“Overall, I have been very blessed in my life. I have experienced ups and downs as anyone has, but it is clear to me that the maximums far outweigh the minimums. The amplitudes have been small, and whenever the function of my life had a remarkable drop, I was sure to come up the other side of the curve and even continue to higher midlines. Looking more closely at my life, I have discovered that my happiness level was almost completely dependent on my relationships. My lowest points were when I lost someone to death or distance, and my highest points were when I was with friends, family, or people whom I loved.” -Excerpt from a student's reflection on "My Life as a Sine Curve"