Author Archives: Matt Boelkins
Alternate ending: draft of a new Chapter 8
I’ve written a rough draft of a very different version of Chapter 8 for Active Calculus (single variable), and I am interested in feedback from users. TL;DR version: I have come to think that the Taylor series representations of the … Continue reading
PreTeXt, Runestone, and the exciting future of open textbooks
In late June, I was fortunate to attend a week-long UTMOST workshop in Ann Arbor that brought together education researchers, PreTeXt developers, Runestone developers, and textbook authors. The newest part to me was learning more about Runestone. Runestone Academy was … Continue reading
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Tagged open source, technology, textbooks
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Active Calculus is Turning 10
“The days are long but the decades are short.” That’s one of my favorite quotes about the nature of time and life, written in 2015 by a then-30-year-old! Ten years ago in early August 2012, I wrote this post that … Continue reading
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A (partial) mastery-grading approach for Active Prelude to Calculus
For the Fall 2020 Pandemic Semester, I taught two sections of GVSU’s 5-credit MTH 124: Functions and Models, our calculus-prep course. This is the course for which I wrote Active Prelude to Calculus, and this was my first time getting … Continue reading
Posted in learning, precalculus, Resources, Teaching
Tagged mastery grading
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Screencasts for Active Prelude to Calculus
My GVSU colleague Mandy Calvillo has developed a fantastic resource for students and instructors using Active Prelude: a YouTube library of 122 (!) short videos that offer additional perspective and explanation on key ideas in the text. The videos are … Continue reading
Back to school updates for Active Prelude, Active Single, and Active Multi
Here is my just-in-time post for back to school, Fall 2020 Edition. Overall: The two main things to know about the Active Calculus textbooks (Active Prelude to Calculus (APC), Active Calculus Single Variable (ACS), and Active Calculus Multivariable (ACM)) are … Continue reading
Posted in General, Publicity, Resources
Tagged activities, free, multivariable calculus, online, open source
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Active Calculus Activities in Google Sheets
Erica Miller of VCU had a brilliant idea: set up AC activities in Google sheets for remote teaching so that her students can work in breakout groups on a shared document. Dave Kung learned about this in an MAA-sponsored session … Continue reading
reminder: Active Calculus YouTube playlists
My GVSU colleagues have developed extensive video content to support all 8 chapters of Active Calculus. Each screencast is enumerated with the section number that aligns with the text. At GV, our Calculus 1 is MTH 201, which corresponds to … Continue reading
Desmos versions of Active Prelude Preview Activities
My colleague Marcia Frobish at GVSU has instantiated each of the preview activities in Active Prelude to Calculus as a Desmos activity. If you are a Desmos user, you should check these out.
Posted in precalculus, Resources
Tagged free, online, resources
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Google groups for Active Calculus
I’m launching two groups for information about the Active Calculus texts: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/active-calculus-announce, where there will be infrequent posts announcing new editions and features, and https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/active-calculus-users, which is a forum for instructors who use (or are considering using) the text. At … Continue reading
