Category: Class Recaps (Page 4 of 6)

WebWork / Exam #1

The WebWork set “Derivatives – Functions” has been extended to Wednesday (Oct 2), and the next set “Derivatives – Power Rule” is also open (due Mon Oct 7).

We will have our first midterm exam on Wednesday Oct 9. I will be posting a list of review exercises for the exam later this week. In the meantime, please work on the open WebWork sets–working through the WebWork exercises will help you prepare for the exam.

The college is closed Wed Oct 2 – Fri Oct 4, so we do not have class Wednesday Oct 2.

Boardshots

We continued discussing the basic differentiation rules (i.e., rules for finding derivatives) which allow us to calculate derivatives of various functions without having to use the limit definition.

We discussed the Constant Rule, the Sum/Difference Rule, and the Constant Multiple Rule. We explained how these rules allow us to easily and quickly differentiate any polynomial function. Please understand the examples we did in class and which are presented in the textbook (Sec 3.3).

On Monday we will discuss the remaining rules presented in that section (the Product Rule and the Quotient Rule).

WebWork

The 2nd WebWork set “Derivatives – Functions” is due Monday (Sept 30). We did some examples from that assignment in class–see below.

Boardshots

We went through some examples from “Derivatives – Functions” where we calculate f'(x) for a given function f(x) using the limit definition.

We then introduced some of the rules for differentiation (i.e., rules for finding the derivative) which are based on the limit definition, but which will allow us to calculate derivates without having the use the limit definition. In particular, the Power Rule will be important–look at some examples in Sec 3.3 which use the Power Rule!

WebWork

The 2nd WebWork set “Derivatives – Functions” is due next Monday (Sept 30).

Boardshots

We went through #4 from “Derivatives – Limit Definition” and introduced the concept of “the derivative function”, i.e, f'(x) as a function that we “derive” from a given function f(x). This is covered in Sec 3.2; please read and understand Examples 3.11 and 3.12 in that section.