Algorithms and Everyday Life
Algorithms are one of the foundations of our technological world, and are driven by the scientists and engineers behind the scenes that write all of these different algorithms. This lesson is intended to get students interested in the inner workings of algorithms and the capabilities associated with them. We start by engaging students with very simple examples of algorithms which they can associate with. We then discuss Google’s PageRank algorithm for ranking the importance of websites based on the other websites that link to them, and play a fun game that can be used to find the same results as the PageRank algorithm.
Think about algorithms as solving a puzzle.Copyright 2020 Alexi Drgac, Colorado School of Mines
Computer scientists and engineers design and implement algorithms to make specific jobs easier and faster to perform. Engineers use algorithms to sort through large sets of data, in order to find critical information more quickly. Google, in particular, engineered an algorithm which helps everyday people find specific information, quickly. Students will learn how valuable creating a sufficient algorithm can be for engineers, as well as the accuracy involved with algorithms.
After this lesson, students should be able to:
- Explain what algorithms do and how they are useful to us.
- Understand what a website network is, and the relative importance of websites.