Student Resources: Calculus Projects
Instructors in the mathematics department care deeply about student learning. Over the years, many instructors have made efforts, either individually or in groups, to enhance student engagement in our core courses, especially the calculus sequence. Below are links to more information about several initiatives that have focused on active, project-based, and inquiry-based learning in calculus. An overview of ten years of these initiatives (2009-2019) can be found in this paper, to appear in PRIMUS.
CAPABLE: Calculus Acquisition through Problem and Activity Based Learning
This site was created in 2009 by Gary Fowler, Sommer Gentry, Amy Ksir and Will Traves. We provided instructors with a set of short, 1-2 day projects that could be plugged into the existing Calculus 1 and Calculus 2 courses. By making these available we were able to encourage a large group of instructors to try this kind of teaching. Links and information about those projects are here, as well as some information about how we assessed the project.
Visit the site at https://sites.google.com/site/
Project Based Calculus II
This site was created in 2016 by Justin Allman, Noble Hetherington III, Amy Ksir and Megan Selbach-Allen. Our goal was to gather a set of projects that would have a longer arc, have a hands-on component, and encourage students to develop the ideas of the course themselves. Links and Information about the projects, an example of the split course syllabus and course calendar, and other information about that project are here.
Inquiry Based Calculus
In 2018, Amy Ksir and Daphne Skipper collected a set of inquiry-based materials to use for Calculus I. Our goal was to replicate the successes of deeper learning in Calculus II, and add structure supporting student buy-in. Links and Information about the materials and syllabus are here (coming soon!).
