Just Remember: + C Published 2008-05-07 under collaboration, creativity

It's AP time! And today is Calculus Day! All that work has come down to just one test. Derivatives, integrals, Riemann sums, rate of change, area of an object. Some memorization and a whole lot of problem solving. You have spent a year preparing your students and now they are on their own, hopefully with a working graphing calculator, new batteries, and a good nights sleep behind them.

Wait a minute... Did you tell them to remember the +C? Or more importantly, will your students remember?

For those non-Calc teachers, most answers to questions involving an integral include a +C (plus some constant). Often, this little item will earn a point for a student on the free-response section, or more accurately, a student will loose a point even if her solution demonstrates complete understanding of the math behind the question (sans the +C).

I was constantly trying to think of ways of getting my students to remember the +C. I tried the stick; I marked a solution totally wrong if it did not include the constant. I tried the carrot; I gave bonus points to students who spotted a missing +C in class work. (Students quickly learned to game this approach.)

A friend of mine has taken a totally different approach. He gathered all of his Calc students and took the picture below. Well Done! What a fun way to remind the students of the importance of +C.

Tech Tags: calculus ap ap+calculus plusC collaboration creativity