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The two Syllabi at the
left are different from the one-page document given to the students on the
first day of class. These are the "official" course syllabi required
by the College Board's AP Audit. Each contains information on the
course philosophy, prerequisites, resources, assessments, and a topics
outline. Click one of the buttons to open
and/or print the appropriate file.
I'm trying to keep all of our major labs and activities
posted on a separate page in an effort to reduce clutter here and copying at
school. Click the Labs button at
the left to locate them.
The College Board
now has a site dedicated to AP courses, and you can click the
AP Central button at the left to check
it out. The site includes general information about all Advanced Placement courses,
including philosophies, prerequisites, topic outlines, and practice
questions. You do have to register to be a member of AP Central (it's
free), but there is a ton of information.
Students can visit
the Brooks/Cole (the textbook publisher)
website for practice quizzes for each chapter. There are also several
web links specific to most sections in the textbook, most of which appear to
be helpful.
Other Information and Activities:
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Summer Information.
For those of
you who are incoming calculus students, here are a few pieces of
information that you might need or find useful.
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Calculator
Information - More on this coming soon... |
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Classroom Information.
The files in this section are more-or-less of an
administrative nature, but I thought having them might help the semester
go smoother for everyone. Feel free to print out whichever ones
you like
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AB Class
Syllabus - Here is the syllabus for the fall semester course given
out in class on the first day of school. It contains a brief
overview of the course, grading and classroom policies, and contact
information. For the record, this is not the same document as
the "official" course syllabus required by College Board (that can be
found by clicking the AB Syllabus button above at the left). |
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BC Class
Syllabus - Here is the spring semester's syllabus. It contains
the same type of information as the AB one, only for the BC course.
For the "official" course syllabus required by College Board, click the
BC Syllabus button above at the left. |
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AB
Assignment Sheet - This is the current "plan" for classroom
assignments in the fall. The assignments will inevitably change
some throughout the semester, but at least this will give you an idea of
what to do if out. |
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BC
Assignment Sheet - This is the outline for the spring classroom
assignments. It usually gets updated during the winter break so I
can adjust what we've accomplished in the fall. |
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AB
Calendar - This is a copy of what I call my "18-week plan" for the
fall. I adjust it several times throughout the semester, but this
will give you an idea of what needs to be done and the pace at which we
have to do it! |
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BC
Calendar - Here is my 18-week plan for spring. You can see the
pace slows down a bit in this one! |
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Classroom Resources.
Here is a little collection of files that should help
supplement what we do in class. I'll try to add more things as
they pop up in class.
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Parent Functions
Review - Here is something that students can print out and use to
review the more common parent functions used in this course. |
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Derivative
Review - This is just a summary of the common derivative rules and
patterns used in this course. |
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Curve
Sketching Summary - I put this together rather hurriedly (that's
code for let me know if you see something wrong), but it should
help with all of those graph behavior problems. |
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Integral Review
- Big surprise... this is a summary of the common integral rules and
patterns used in this course. |
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Integration by Parts - Here's a little document demonstrating the
"table technique" for evaluating certain integrals that require
integration by parts. |
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Euler's Method
- This document was written to
demonstrate how to use Excel for Euler's method of approximating
solutions to differential equations. For the record,
it is assumed the reader knows a little about Excel and a lot about
Euler's method. |
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Convergence Test
Conclusions - Some students have asked for a sample of how one
should answer problems that require the use of the many convergence
tests used in class. This document should
help answer those questions. |
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Euler's Identity
- I just thought this was a neat way of using power series to prove one
of the cooler equations out there. |
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Chapter Review
Keys.
Needless to
say, this part is "under construction". I hope to eventually post
all of the chapter reviews here so students can use them from home
instead of having to wait until the next morning. At least I have
everything through Chapter 6 done now...
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TI-89
Mini-Tutorials.
I had to
create a few tutorial presentations for one of my online courses about
the uses of the TI-89 calculator in a calculus course. I thought
others might find them helpful for certain topics. The
presentations below cover most of the important uses in AB, and I hope
to add more (including BC stuff) soon.
NOTE: These presentations assumes the older OS... I'm hoping to
eventually edit these to include some of the newer features (such as the impDif()
command).
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Exam Resources.
The following links are a few files that you might find
useful in preparation for my exams in class. I hope to add to this
list as the semester goes one, so check back. If you have any
suggestions, please let me know!
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Midterm Exam Goodies. Here are two
documents worth looking at as you prepare for the midterm examination:
the
topics
being tested and a few review
exercises
(now with solutions!). |
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Final Exam Goodies. Like the midterm, here are the
topics being
assessed on the final exam as well as a few review
exercises (you can revisit those for the midterm, too). I've also got an old final
exam -
it's different in format, but the questions and extra practice might
be of some use as far as reviewing goes. |
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Exam Example.
Several students have asked what my exams are like (format, types of
problems, length, etc) and how I grade
them, so here is an
example.
It covers the material presented in Chapter 1 and the summer packet.
If you want to, print it out and take the exam as though it were real
(timed at 90 minutes). I'd be more than happy to 'grade' it so you
can see what that is like. This is optional, and not a grade. |
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Last Minute Review Materials.
Here is a whole bunch of
things that might be useful as you prepare for the real AP exam... by "a
whole bunch", I mean two:
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Brief Review - This document presents a quick overview of the
topics covered on the AP exam. The first couple of
pages list a few patterns and techniques for differentiation and
integration - think of it as a refresher for some of those obscure
calculations. The last couple of pages lists out the topics that
are common on the AP exam - I encourage you to look over those and study
the topics that are more-or-less vague to you. |
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Textbook Review
- This is the document that my two groups created in class. It
basically goes through the textbook in a linear fashion highlighting
topics that should be reviewed prior to the exam. Some topics
refer back to notes within a section of the textbook - these topics
were presented in that lesson, but are not explicitly in the textbook. |
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Advanced
Placement Averages.
For those interested, the table
below shows the test averages for students taking the AP exam at my
school. The data for 1999 and 2000 is for South Cobb High School
and the rest is for Kennesaw Mountain High School. Starting with 2007,
the data
includes a recent push to encourage some on-level calculus students to
try AB, something I'm excited to offer!
These
aren't just my students, for the record. As our program has grown,
I had to start sharing these wonderful classes with others! I
definitely have to give credit to Susan Roach ('05), Clint Stockton ('06, '07,
& '08), and Susan Morlan ('07 & '08) - I couldn't ask for better people to work with!
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Exam
Year |
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AB
Exam |
Number
of Students |
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BC
Exam |
AB
Subscore |
Number
of Students |
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1999 |
- |
3.077 |
13 |
- |
N/A |
N/A |
N/A |
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2000 |
- |
4.000 |
3 |
- |
N/A |
N/A |
N/A |
|
|
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2001 |
- |
4.000 |
2 |
- |
N/A |
N/A |
N/A |
|
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2002 |
- |
4.417 |
12 |
- |
4.800 |
4.800 |
5 |
|
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2003 |
- |
4.857 |
7 |
- |
4.743 |
4.846 |
13 |
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2004 |
- |
4.500 |
12 |
- |
4.550 |
4.800 |
20 |
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2005 |
- |
4.286 |
7 |
- |
4.700 |
4.800 |
50 |
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2006 |
- |
4.000 |
12 |
- |
4.213 |
4.681 |
47 |
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2007 |
- |
3.429 |
28 |
- |
4.543 |
4.804 |
46 |
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2008 |
- |
3.696 |
23 |
- |
4.644 |
4.889 |
45 |
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Software
Downloads.
The links below take you to various places
where you can download various software applications you might find
useful in class. Some are freeware, others are free trials and
require purchase after a period of time.
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Advanced Grapher
is a graphing software application that allows students to graph relations
of different types in one window, then copy and paste them into other
applications. This versatile program has proven useful for students in their lab reports
and other graphing activities. A product key is required after 30
days, and that key is available to all students attending KMHS.
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TI InterActive! is a software application from Texas Instruments that is
basically a word processor and graphing calculator in one. While it is
available for students in class at KMHS, some students prefer to have a personal copy
at home for lab reports in math and science. Follow the link for more information and a downloadable demo version.
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Winplot is a
graphing software application that allows students to do just about
anything, including create three-dimensional graphs. This is especially
helpful when working with vector functions.
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MathGV is another
graphing software application that allows students to create certain
three-dimensional graphs. This one is especially helpful when working with
solids of revolutions.
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Note: In AP Calculus (BC) and
Multivariable Calculus, we will be using a software application called
Maple. It is the same mathematics program used by most Georgia
universities, including Georgia Tech. There is no demo version
available, but students can purchase a version for personal use at an
incredible discount if interested. Just so you know, all work done
with Maple in my courses can be completed in class, so a personal copy is
certainly not required. For more information, visit the Maple
website.
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| Just For Fun.
Here are a few
quotes from class, as recorded by the 2003 group...
"That test was
so easy!"
"Factorial
SCREAMS ratio test."
"How do you
not know that?"
"Partial
fraction decomposition is easy for the 'calculurs' master."
"How do you do
this integral thing again... just derive four times?"
"Well... if
you can't plug numbers into a calculator by this time, you shouldn't be
taking the AP test."
"Did you know
that e ip
+ 1 = 0?"
"It's all about the recreational math!"
"The Chain Rule... how can I forget the Chain Rule!"
"Remember the trig..."
"Ah, trig... my old nemesis."
"Yeah... that's why the laptop says 'I suck' on it." |
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