AP

Calculus BC Syllabus

Course Overview

This course covers all of the topics listed in the AP Calculus BC Course Description. When
time allows, the course also covers some topics that are not required for Calculus BC
students but that enhance students understanding of the concepts. These additional topics
include business and economics applications of Calculus that students who plan to study
business appreciate. My primary objective in my approach to teaching this course is to
provide my students with an appreciation for the beauty and power of Calculus and to foster
in them a desire to further their mathematical studies with even more advanced coursework.

At the start of the course, students are expected to be fully proficient with the material that
was covered both before and during Precalculus, including but not limited to the
language and properties of functions, the properties and graphs of various families of
functions (e.g. polynomial, rational, trigonometric, exponential, logarithmic, etc.), and
extreme facility with algebraic expressions. As an example, proficiency with the
trigonometric functions is essential when we cover their differentiation formulas: students
work together using the definition of the derivative and their knowledge of trigonometric
identities in order to develop the differentiation formulas themselves.

Our school operates on a block schedule with 85-minute class periods that meet every day.
Students take 4 courses during the 1st semester and 4 different courses during the 2nd
semester. Because of the semester scheduling system, all students who enroll in AP Calculus
BC are also required to successfully complete AP Calculus AB first. This prerequisite is
essential in order to allow for coverage of all AP Calculus BC topics within a semester with
a fast pace for the topics that were covered in AP Calculus AB and a slower pace for the BC-
only topics.

Minimal class time is devoted to traditional lecture. The majority of class time is devoted to
student exploration and discovery, frequently in collaboration with peers. Students are
encouraged to investigate all topics from multiple perspectives: numerical, graphical, and
analytical, and are continually required to express their thinking and their solutions verbally
in both oral and written forms. For essentially every topic, students are presented with
functions given in the form of equations, graphs, tables, and verbal descriptions and become
proficient in applying each new Calculus concept in all of these forms as well as making
connections between the forms. Whether informally when explaining a solution in class or
formally on tests, students must also be able to correctly express the mathematics in
complete sentences with correct, precise terminology. Throughout the course, students
refine their ability to justify their mathematical work.

By the completion of the course, students will be proficient in all the required topics in the
AP Calculus BC Course Description. In addition to passing the AP exam, students should be
prepared for success in future mathematics courses, having developed a solid foundational
understanding of both the concepts and mechanics of Calculus.

Technology

All students in this course are required to own a TI-84+ calculator. Students use their
calculators in class on most days; however, they are primarily used for the purposes of initial
exploration and/or to analyze, interpret, or verify results attained by analytical methods.
Using the calculator as an exploration and experimentation tool allows students to develop
an initial conceptual understanding of a topic prior to investigating it in a more detailed
manner using analytical methods. Using the calculator to verify results is particularly
beneficial when trying to assess the reasonableness of a solution attained by other methods.

One example of a calculator-based activity is the numerical evaluation of limits. Using the
table feature of the calculator, students investigate what happens to the values of
expressions when approaching particular x-values with various increments and make
conjectures about the values of the limits. The calculator also offers an immediate
connection to the graphical evaluation of limits: students can analyze the graphs of the same
expressions and discover that they reveal the same information about the functions
behavior. In this activity, the calculator removes the tedious process of calculating a long list
of numerical values or drawing the graphs by hand and allows students to instantly focus on
their conceptual understanding of limits.

All assessments (both quizzes and tests) are divided into a no-calculator section and a
calculator-allowed section. The sections are sometimes divided equally, but in most cases
the no-calculator section makes up a larger portion of the assessment. On all assignments,
students are required to show all of their work either in the form of mathematical
expressions or in complete sentences using precise mathematical language regardless of
whether or not a calculator was used to perform some of the calculations.

Although students are not required to use additional technology beyond their graphing
calculators on a regular basis, I frequently use other technological resources such as
GeoGebra and other online tools to provide visual representations of new or difficult-to-
grasp concepts (such as solids of revolution).

In general, students know how to use their calculators to view the graphs of functions, to
solve equations, and to find the numerical derivative or integral of a function, but the
algebraic/analytical methods of each process are emphasized equally or more heavily than
the calculator methods. In all cases of technology use, the purpose of its integration in the
classroom is to enhance not substitute for students understanding of the concepts of
Calculus.

Student Evaluation

Students are assessed informally on a daily basis in class in both oral and written forms.
Students are expected to articulate their mathematical ideas with proper language and
terminology at all times, regardless of the medium of assessment.

One activity that requires students to express their thoughts orally is an in-class assignment
in which students compare sets of 3 graphs and determine which one in each set of 3 is the
graph of f, the graph of f, and the graph of f. Students must be able to articulate their
justifications as to why they have classified the graphs in a particular way, drawing on their
knowledge of the relationships between a function and its derivatives.

On a more formal basis, students frequently turn in problem sets that span several days or a
whole unit of material. Students are permitted to work together when completing these
problems, but each student is required to submit an individual assignment with his or her
own representation of the solution process. These solutions must include both the
mathematical steps and written explanations and justifications.

Students also complete various projects throughout the course. For example, after studying
related rates, students complete a project in which they write and solve their own related
rates problems. They are required to create a problem of sufficient complexity,
simultaneously ensuring that all necessary given information is provided and that the
problem is written with clear and correct language. Students must solve the problem and
then create a visual representation of their problem, including the full mathematical
solution, accompanied by written explanations and justifications of the steps.

Students are assessed in the form of quizzes approximately once per week and tests
approximately once every two weeks. The format of quizzes and tests resemble the structure
of the AP exam: multiple choice and free response questions, divided into a no-calculator and
a calculator-allowed section. The free response questions are frequently pulled from the
archive of past AP free response problems.

The final exam covers the content of the entire course. It is structured and graded in the style
of the AP exam with timed sections for each of the four parts of the AP Calculus exam, but the
number of questions is reduced to accommodate the shorter time duration of the final exam
period: 90 minutes total.

Course Outline

The outline below represents the timeline of the course and the topics that are presented. All
times listed are approximate and include time for review and assessment.

Unit 1: Prerequisites for Calculus (Completed by students prior to the beginning of the
semester)

Unit 2: Limits and Continuity (3 days)
Rates of Change and Limits
Limits Involving Infinity
Continuity
Rates of Change and Tangent Lines

Unit 3: Derivatives (5 days)
Derivative of a Function
o Concept of the derivative
o Derivative at a point
o Derivative as a function
o Higher order derivatives
Differentiability
Rules for Differentiation
o The Power Rule
o Derivatives of Sums, Products, and Quotients of Functions
Velocity and Other Rates of Change
Derivatives of Trigonometric Functions

Unit 4: More Derivatives (4 days)
Chain Rule
Implicit Differentation
Derivatives of Inverse Functions and Inverse Trigonometric Functions
Derivatives of Exponential and Logarithmic Functions

Unit 5: Applications of Derivatives (7 days)
Extreme Values of Functions
The Mean Value Theorem for Derivatives
Graphical Analysis of Functions (relating the graphs of f, f, and f) and Curve
Sketching
Modeling and Optimization
Linearization and Differentials
Related Rates

Unit 6: The Definite Integral (7 days)
Estimating with Finite Sums
Definite Integrals as a Limit of Riemann Sums

Antiderivatives
Average Value of a Function
The Mean Value Theorem for Integrals
The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus
The Trapezoidal Rule

Unit 7: Differential Equations and Modeling (8 days)
Slope Fields and Eulers Method
Antidifferentiation by Substitution
Antidifferentiation by Parts
Exponential Growth and Decay
Separable Differential Equations
Logistic Growth

Unit 8: Applications of Integrals (7 days)
Integral as Net Change
Areas in the Plane
Volumes using the Disk, Washer, and Shell Methods
Lengths of Curves
Applications from Science and Statistics

Unit 9: LHpitals Rule, Improper Integrals, and Partial Fractions (6 days)
Sequences
LHpitals Rule
Relative Rates of Growth
Improper Integrals

Unit 10: Infinite Series (14 days)
Concept of Series
Series of Constants
Power Series
Taylor and Maclaurin Series
Taylors Theorem
Radius and Interval of Convergence
Testing Convergence at Endpoints
Error Bounds

Unit 11: Parametric, Vector, and Polar Functions (8 days)
Parametric Functions
Vectors in the Plane
Polar Functions

Remaining course time is used for AP exam review.

Textbook and Resources

Primary Textbook (all students have a copy of this text):

Finney, Ross L., Franklin D. Demana, Bert K. Waits, and Daniel Kennedy. Calculus: Graphical,
Numerical, Algebraic: AP Edition. Boston: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Secondary Textbook (teacher resource only):

Stewart, James. Calculus, 5th edition. Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole.


Various AP materials (curriculum modules and released multiple choice and free response
questions from past exams) are used throughout the course both in class and on
assessments.