Bench's Reflection

1) Why did you choose the concepts you did to create your problem set?

The Derivative and the Integral are the 2 major concepts of Calculus. So we tried to show as much of those as possible by using their many applications such as optimizing the volume of a box and accumulation functions. Also we wanted to show the concepts more than the mechanics because the AP exam itself measures understanding of concepts rather than how well the mechanical stuff is.


2) How do these problems provide an overview of your best mathematical understanding of what you have learned so far?

What the group tried to do was to work on questions that we were best at. We chose to do that because that would make the quality of the set of questions as high as possible for us and whoever is going to read it in the future. Some of us had questions that involved a weakness but we continued and actually got better at the concept. I remember hearing from Jamie complaining that she didn't feel good about working on the question involving related rates. Now after all of this is over, she feels much more comfortable with the concept. Even if the question wasn't a weakness, it still increased our understanding of the concept.

3) Did you learn anything from this assignment? Was it educationally valuable to you?

I didn't really learn anything new that was related to Calculus but I did increase my understanding of Calculus. Well I guess that can be considered learning something new. It took forever to make the functions for the optimization and differential equation questions.

For the optimization question, I was playing with the different parameters of the polynomial function. I was trying to make the shape of the function the way I wanted it to be. So I changed the parameters one at a time but as the number got more larger negatively and positively, the changes began getting more exaggerated. All of this experimenting with polynomial functions got me kind of frustrated. Once the general shape of the function was discovered, I was relieved and continued playing with the parameters to make it into a larger scale.

Differential Equations was a strength of Zeph and I, but when it came to thinking of a function, the tables were turned. It turns out that we were strong with the mechanics and some concepts. We weren't strong with understanding the differential functions and how to make them. It took a while and we agreed on a function that involved a cool trick. I won't talk about the trick here, it is your job to find out by reading the question.


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To be honest, this project was such a hassle. The math part was enjoyable and useful for reviewing for the exam, but the presentation part killed me. The amount of filming and editing required was nothing I've ever done before. It's funny how I'm making this sound horrible.

The effort I put into the math was very helpful towards reviewing for the exam. Getting to work with other people on the questions was helpful as well because it allowed me to sometimes see another angle of a question. Making our own questions was quite entertaining because we tried to make the numbers fit the scenario, but most of it came out unrealistic.

Video Editing took a lot of my time. Time that I could have used in working on the questions. There were many difficulties but I learned how to fix them. Slideshare was messing up on me, telling me that my slide show had 700 slides, which made me use up even more time in fixing the slides.

Overall, I had fun. I think my group had fun.