New York Times Mathematics Lessons

The mathematics lesson plans on this website are up-to-date, thought-provoking, and decidedly interdisciplinary. Students read recent NYT articles (included on the website) to get information about topics in the news (Hurricane Floyd, Kosovar refugees, and summer melon recipes are three recent examples). For most lessons, the math used is not demanding and is limited to obtaining data, then graphing it or performing simple manipulations.

Some of the lessons call for students to articulate their thoughts about the place of math in society (calculators in the classroom, mathematical metaphors in art). The lesson plans are really well supported, with warm-up and wrap-up exercises, as well as links to related NYT articles. You can even choose to have selected vocabulary words and geographical references in the articles shown as hyperlinks to a dictionary or encyclopedia. It's worth checking in with this site from time to time, as lessons are added on a regular basis.