During the International Mathematica Symposium in Maastricht during the summer of 2008, Ben talked to Dan (especially Dan) and me about coming to China so that I could share my work with his students and other educational leaders in China. I was skeptical that much would come of these conversations, but after connecting with Ben again at the International Mathematica User Conference in Champaign, Illinois in the fall, it was clear that Ben was determined to put something together. Ben's conference became the International Symposium on Mathematica-Based System Simulation and Education Technologies (SSET 2009) www.sset2009.org ("English" link on the bottom right).

Our first official conference activity was a visit to Ben's Data Structures class on Wednesday. Ben teaches in the Department of Industrial Engineering at Tsinghua University. There were about 80 second-year undergraduates in the class. A group of students gave the lecture for the day about algorithm analysis and then a few other groups shared their progress on their semester-long projects. They talked about Rubik's cubes, encryption, music, and animation. They presented everything with Mathematica and spoke in English. Their work is quite similar to the types of projects my students enjoy. During their presentation, the students included some Mathematica modules that looked very familiar to me: a 2x2x2 puzzle cube and a piano. They had used the Demonstrations I had published on the Wolfram Research web site as a resource for their project. The trouble was, they had not credited their source. It was funny, but the students were shocked with embarrassment when I showed them the original files on my computer. Ben took advantage of the teachable moment and reminded students how important resource citations are and that one never knows exactly who will be in the audience and what they will know. (I told my students this story when I returned home. It made for a nice lesson and reminder for them too.) Ben's students impressed us with their work and presentation talents. After class, Dan impressed the students with his entertaining skills.

A highlight of our week was dinner on Wednesday night with the grandparents of one of my students. I told my classes that I was headed to Beijing and a few days later I received an invitation for dinner at a restaurant famous for its Peking Duck. We had a delightful time chatting about our trip and the city. Even though Mrs. Zhou does not speak much English, she was quite attentive and happy to meet us. After dinner I showed them a brief video of my class that included their grandson. Mr. Zhou took us on a walking tour of the area around our hotel that is next to the university and next to the apartments where they live. Certainly a small world.

Friday was the beginning of the conference and my presentation was the first one after the introduction. No, I did not speak in Chinese. They had two translators working during the English presentations. One would listen and say the Chinese translation to a typist whose notes appeared on a screen to the right of the presentation screen.

	Abby Brown 美国著名中学数学老师，从1996起在美国圣地亚哥的Torrey Pines High School教授 高中数学，并在多次在地区性，国家性，及国际会议上发表关于其教学经验的演讲。 沃尔夫勒姆研究公司，微软，联想等多家公司都与 Abby Brown进行合作，为其学生 提供多种技术支持。 Abby Brown 同时在其学校及地区，担任的数学教育主席的工 作。
从基本的计算和问题解答，到互动的三维图形， Mathematica 对于讲解及学习数学是一个强大的工具。在 其发言中，Abby Brown将展示将Mathematica 通过不同的形式纳入到数学课堂，并分享其他学生及教师使 用 Mathematica教学及学习的经验。此外，Abby Brown还将分享其高中和初中的学生基于Mathematica制 作的教学课件，并展示们在数学，科学，艺术，音乐，和其他科目的兴趣！ 更多关于其制作的课件请访问: www.MathematiClub.com 以及Abby Brown的主页: www.abbymath.com

 

My talk went very well. My students helped me a lot before the conference by giving me typed Chinese translations of my bullets points and they also made a video about how my students use Mathematica and the types of projects that they have done. Even the video had Chinese subtitles! I received many positive comments and good feedback.
	Most of the presentations were in Chinese. Our favorite of those was watching Ben's students give their presentation again with revisions based on comments from Wednesday. (It was somewhat embarrassing to me when they over-embellished their credit to me for the Mathematica cube and piano, but it made for a good story for this education audience.) Link

The first day of the conference ended with a panel of the keynote speakers. We then all went out to dinner at the same Peking Duck restaurant where Dan and I were treated earlier.

There was a lot less pressure on me for the second day of the conference. Dan and I enjoyed the morning presentations, but then ducked out (with permission) after lunch since the rest of the day was all in Chinese.

An interesting note about the restaurant: they give you a certificate for your duck. It tells you what number duck you are served, counting from the opening of the restaurant in 1864. Our Wednesday night duck was number 115,114,977.

During our lunches, dinners, and other conference time together, those of us who use Mathematica brainstormed on ideas for the International Mathematica Symposium in 2010. The current plan is to hold it in Beijing. Dan was asked to be part of the planning committee. . . He may need to attend my Advanced Topics class next year.

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