Maths for IT

QQI Level 5 (5N18396) | Dublin College Dundrum | 2023–24

Maths for IT taught through a combination of traditional worksheets, Python visualisations, and applied problem sets. The course ran September through March, with the exam in the spring. Python was used throughout to make abstract mathematical concepts concrete and to introduce students to the computational dimension of the material.

September–October: Foundation Building

Arithmetic, algebraic thinking, data types, binary and hexadecimal. These are the assignment-only sections of the QQI module — they don't appear on the exam but form the foundation for everything that follows.

Programming context: variables and data types in Python mirror the algebraic and numerical ideas in this section. Students who struggled with symbolic algebra often found the programming context easier to start with.

October–November: Functions

Polynomials, quadratics, linear equations, and transformations of functions.

Resources for Polynomials, Quadratics, and Linear Equations

The following topics were covered week by week:

October: Linear equations and practice
November 8: Quadratic (polynomial) practice
November 15: Transformations of functions — translations, reflections, scaling
November 22: Quadratics and linear equation practice
November 25: Summary of class structure changes; additional Khan Academy practice topics allocated
November 29: Polynomials review (degree, coefficients, roots); introduction to derivatives; differentiable vs. non-differentiable functions; derivative at a point (slope, maxima and minima); algebra of derivatives for polynomials

December: Calculus — Derivatives and Limits

Resources:

Week by week:

December 2: Derivative notation intuition; derivative rules (multiplication, division, chain rule); limit intuition, convergence, divergence
December 6: Derivative practice; chain rule, multiplication rule, division rule; limits and derivatives
December 9: Derivative and limit practice
December 13: Limits and derivatives; exponential and polynomial growth; introduction to trigonometric functions (intuition)
December 16: Review of derivatives
December 20: Review of functions and calculus

January: Trigonometric Functions and Complex Numbers

Resources:

Week by week:

Week 1: Intro to complex numbers, unit circle, trig functions
Week 2: Trig functions and their relationship to complex numbers; review of exponential functions and linear programming for assignment; Pythagorean triples and trigonometric ratios; unit circle principles
Week 3: Complex numbers and trigonometry
Week 4: Assignment review and trigonometry review

February: Probability and Statistics

Resources:

Week by week:

Week 1: Random variables, means, medians, modes, expected value, and variance
Week 2: Distributions and descriptive statistics
Week 3: Break
Week 4: Probability games and visualisations — including the Birthday Paradox code commenting exercise

March: Algorithms and Exam Review

Week by week:

Week 1: Algorithmic runtime and Big-O notation; coding some probability functions
Week 2: Arrays and indexing
Week 3: Search and recursion
Week 4: Exam review
Final week: Exam review

End of Year Reflections

At the end of the year, students completed a reflective piece looking back at the course and forward to what comes next. See End of Year Reflections for the prompt and context.

See also: Learning Mathematics Through Programming for the broader approach to teaching maths in a programming context.