Monthly Schedule

(AP Calculus AB, Period A)

W 9/7/05	First day of class.
Th 9/8/05	HW due: Read §§1-1 and 1-2. Reading notes are required, as always. Quiz on the alphabet and the attendance policies.
F 9/9/05	HW due: §1-2 #1-10 all, 14-24 even. Quiz (probably ungraded) on precalculus, mainly to see what you remember.
M 9/12/05	HW due: Make a sketchy graph, with axes and units marked, showing a cumulative distance vs. time graph for a believable morning commute to school. Your graph should be different from everyone else’s graph. Graph paper is not required. Compute (a) the maximum instantaneous speed attained during your morning commute, (b) the average speed on your morning commute, (c) the total distance covered, and (d) the longest wait at a stoplight or stop sign. Show a sentence of explanation for each answer.
T 9/13/05	HW due: Read §§1-3 and 1-4. Reading notes are required, as always (see HW guidelines for format).
W 9/14/05	HW due: §1-3 #Q1-Q10 all, 1-4 all. Check your answers for questions 1 through 4 in the second group by using MATH 9 on your TI calculator, which is the fnInt function. (You may have to open the user’s manual to learn the proper syntax.)
Th 9/15/05	HW due: §1-4 #9, 10, 13, 14. Show work with “. . .” to indicate missing details, but use the Thingy to accomplish the heavy gruntwork. (See “Links Based on Class Discussions.”)
F 9/16/05	HW due: Read §1-5; write §1-5 #1-10 all, 15, 16. For #1-10, you must make a sketch for each one. Practice making sloppy sketches, i.e., sketches that take no more than 20 seconds to make. Then show your answer in the style shown below. 1. yes; 9. no;
Weekend	Study for test. Here are the answers to #15 and #16 to help you prepare. 15.(a) Although the first two terms of f (x) are continuous, the third term makes a sudden jump from –1 to 1 (a change of 2 units) as x passes through 2. (b) (Note: It is not acceptable to write “3” by itself.) (c) (Again, you may not simply write “5” by itself.) (d) In order for a limit to exist, the left-sided and right-sided limits must exist and must be equal real numbers. Or, you could provide this “HappyCal explanation” for (d): Let e = 0.2. (Actually, any value between 0 and 1 will suffice.) Then whenever 0 < |x – 2| < d, regardless of how small the positive number d is, f (x) will attain some values that are less than 3 and some values that are greater than 5. Let us call that set of f values by the name J, where J represents the “image” or “range” of f restricted to the domain 0 < |x – 2| < d. In order for the definition of limit to be satisfied, there must exist a real number L such that the set J is a subset of some open interval I = (L – e, L + e). However, that is impossible, since I covers less than half a unit, and J covers more than 2 units. I don’t expect you to understand the “HappyCal” version completely; after all, if you could, you should be enrolled in that course instead. However, reading it and understanding part or most of it is instructive. The first answer given is sufficient for our course. 16.(a) I presume you can do this. You should have a line with slope 1 leading to an open circle at the point (2, 3), a closed circle on the point (2, 1), and a branch of a parabola making a “Nike check mark” starting with an open circle at (2, 3). (b) Yes, namely (2, 3). (c) (d) No, f (2) = 2 from the definition of the function. (e) We would need to have f (2) = 3 in order for the function to be continuous at x = 2.
M 9/19/05	Test on Chapter 1. Under new math department policies, you will be required to take a different test as a make-up test if you miss the test today. The make-up test will be offered at 7:00 a.m. on Tuesday, 9/20/2005, and is not guaranteed to be of equivalent difficulty.
T 9/20/05	HW due: Read §§2-1 and 2-2. Reading notes are required, as always. Prepare the exploratory problems in §2-1 for oral presentation. For example, you could use make a table on your calculator for question 1b instead of writing it out. However, you will probably need to jot down the answers to 1c, 1d, etc., in order to avoid forgetting them. Reading math is different from reading other subjects. You must have a calculator, pencil, and paper handy at all times so that you can experiment with topics (like the exploratory problems) that appear in the text. Also, you must read math much, much more slowly than when you are reading a novel or a newspaper article. Every word and every symbol count. In class: Go over test. The scores were excellent overall. Congratulations, class!
W 9/21/05	HW due: Write §2-2 #13. If possible, please also prepare #1-6 for oral presentation. (Some people “get it” and will find these to be easy. Others may need to ask for help.)
Th 9/22/05	HW due: §2-3 #7-17 all, 24 (reading notes optional).
F 9/23/05	HW due: Read §2-4; write §2-3 #20.
M 9/26/05	No additional HW due. Get lots of sleep this weekend, and make sure that your existing homework assignments are fully up to date, in proper format.
T 9/27/05	HW due: Read §2-5; write §2-4 #21-48 mo3, 59-67 odd.
W 9/28/05	HW due: Read §2-6; write §2-5 #3, 6, 9, 12, 14.
Th 9/29/05	HW due: Write §2-6 #1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13.
F 9/30/05	Quiz on §§2-1 through 2-5. Focus on knowing the definitions in a “verbal” sense, especially the two types of limits that were written on the board yesterday. You should also know the continuity definitions and related terms that we discussed in class (e.g., cusp, punctured neighborhood, tolerance, left- and right-hand derivatives). There is no additional written HW due.

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Last updated: 04 Oct 2005