EJMT Abstract

Presenting high school or college students with the mathematical description of billiards behavior in an elliptical domain will undoubtedly inspire them to tackle even more challenging problems over time. The development of the related algorithms will also give the students an excellent opportunity to consciously use suitable Computer Algebra Systems (CAS). In particular, the implementation of calculations in exact rational arithmetic and the management of integer numbers of arbitrarily large dimensions, with an appropriate CAS, will help the interested parties to discriminate some statements concerning the delicate issue of the possible periodicity of the trajectories generated by the subsequent reflections of the billiards on the boundaring ellipses.