Reply to Bad for students, who apply for CS or engineering, to take AP Calc AB and then BC?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]You can just look up the course description from a college board.

https://apcentral.collegeboard.org/media/pdf/ap-calculus-ab-and-bc-course-and-exam-description.pdf

In the prerequisites section, it’s clear they aren’t supposed to be taken in sequence. The only additional prerequisite is that students are familiar with basic series and sequences, usually covered in precalculus if not algebra 2.

It’s fine if students want to take AB+BC, just as it is fine to repeat Algebra if the foundation is not there. Obviously very strong students don’t typically repeat material because they can handle it in one pass well enough. Making AB a prerequisite goes against the College Board course description and recommendation.[/quote]

And yet many high schools make AB a prerequisite to BC, and have done so for many years, and the College Board goes on certifying their courses as official AP courses.[/quote]

College board audits courses, not certifies them. Why wouldn’t they, it’s about the course contents, covered material and standards. If the schools wants to have a third of the class take AP calculus then it makes sense to herd them through the AB and BC in sequence, but honestly I think the top 5-10% of the class could just go straight to BC. It’s a disservice to them to do make AB mandatory.

So far the only argument for taking AB+BC is that somebody’s kid did this and ended up a a good school. Good for them, I don’t think it’s a red flag for admissions, it’s just that repeating material to get a better “foundation” is not optimal.[/quote]

For the numerous high schools that separate the AP calculus into two separate years, AB and BC, and REQUIRE AB then BC, due to the BC course being designed to start mid-curriculum for what College board lists as BC, there is NOchoice for the students. Need it or not, it is taught over two yrs by design by those (usually private) HS. Who cares? No one. Those students are following what they have to do in their HS curriculum. AOs understand that there is not unnecessary “repetition “, rather the pace is just slowed and split into two yrs, on purpose. [/quote]

The PP that gets hung up on course title and repetition is missing the forest for the trees. As someone pointed out this is how math is taught throughout, on a spiral, reinforcement past concepts introduce new.

With the right cohort of kids, there is enough depth in algebra 1 to make a challenging class.Two years of calculus is not remedial if the school plans it that way. OTOH, there are ways to teach MV or linear, that are not at all engaging. Collection of techniques without motivation, no student participation or discussion. Plenty of CC classes are exactly that. Crazy, but being in a room with engaged students  is more important than course title.[/quote]

This!   It’s not about the course title.  It’s about how you reinforce the material you have already covered and go further in depth on it.   I would much rather a student come in with a strong understanding of series and what an integral really is than to have been exposed to matrix algebra.  The latter is a tool - an important one but is sort of rote.  Deeper understanding of the operators of calculus is a lot more important and needs to be repeated/reinforced.  [/quote]

The way you talk about it, I’m willing to bet you don’t know what an “integral really is”. lol at “matrix algebra”, a sad confusion about matrix representation of vectors in linear algebra, which is a “tool, an important one but sort if rote”. Operators are in linear algebra, not calculus.

And on top of it you have the nerve to say it’s not about the title! Well duh, that’s as far as you read![/quote]

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