Many students in the biological sciences do not have strong mathematical skills, yet population biology requires the use of mathematical tools such as calculus to model population dynamics. The approach I have taken is to put simple models in English and show students how there is an equivalent mathematical expression or symbolism for each phrase or part of the sentence. The goals has been to get the student to buy into the biological assumptions of the modeling effort before they ever see an equation. This hopefully dymystifies the mathematics and gets them to think about the biological content of equations of growth dynamics. This software allows the student to generate graphs of models easily while putting the mathematical symbolism into pictorial form.
Students seem to feel comfortable with pictures of a model.