<p>Kids in BC cover all the AB calc by January, usually. AB moves at about half the speed…and I have no idea what they do the next year.</p>
<p>Bear in mind that the OP’s school offers BC only in the spring. The spring term in our school begins in February. AP exams are in early May. If the BC class were to cover all of the AB and BC materials in only 31/2 months, it would need to proceed at a breakneck speed.</p>
<p>Reflectivemom, I’d have to ask my older son! From what I understand, the first half of AP Calc AB is really pre-calculus, following Algebra II/Trigonometry in sophomore year. I believe that AP Calculus BC picks up where AB finished in junior year, and covers more than what the collegeboard expects. H has a graduate degree in math, and he seems to feel that the way the material is covered is pretty in-depth. As I mentioned, S1 is a physics major, minoring in math, at a selective college. He’s doing well, but I know he works hard for his grades – it’s not a cake-walk. I don’t think that math (including calculus) is a subject one can master in a semester – it’s always possible to go deeper.</p>
<p>This whole thing probably varies quite a bit from school to school. Some schools probably do cover the AB portion in the first half of BC. So I’m not sure what they are doing at my sons’ school. They seem to have plenty of homework through both AB and BC, and the kids seem challenged. This is an all-male private HS, so I’d expect that lots of boys would take BC calc, but that’s not really the case. There is clearly a gating mechanism, where only the most serious math students can or would want to do the BC calc with or without AP physics. There are around 300 kids per grade level, and I think they usually have only one section of BC Calc – basically only 10% of the kids take math to this level.</p>
<p>Son found that when he went to college they highly advised not using AP credit to skip major courses.</p>
<p>Sax, what we found with our older son is that almost all of the students taking any level of calculus in college had already taken BC calc, at a minimum. He did move into a higher level, based on taking BC calculus, but worked his tail off. This is a kid with multiple 800’s on SAT’s and a 5 on the AP BC Calc test. It seems that taking the AP classes in math or science are almost a prerequisite for majoring in the subjects in college. We would recommend that our next son not use AP credits if he attends a similar college – just look at the AP class as a prereq.</p>
<p>I just looked up the course catalog at sons’ HS – AP Calculus AB is listed as a prereq for AP Calculus BC. They must be doing something more than the collegboard suggests.</p>
<p>
If you are talking specifically about Calculus BC no, very few take it as juniors. I think there were five juniors in a class of 650. It’s very, very difficult to persuade the powers that be that there might be some 7th graders ready for algebra. Two of those juniors took pre-calc in the summer.</p>
<p>But as for other APs lots, and lots of juniors take APs. Most honors students take APUSH and one of the sciences minimally. They’ll usually do a project or write a major research paper between mid May and mid June.</p>
<p>Oh and in AP Physics C they spent the remainder of the year watching sci fi movies and playing ping pong on the lab tables. I believe my son was the only junior in that class.</p>
<p>mathmom:</p>
<p>I asked because my S graduated as a junior and found himself incredibly busy in the last couple of weeks of May after the APs. He had senior finals (also finals for his two college classes). No finals were held in the first week of June, and graduation was either in the first or second week. He was also expected to complete in about ten days the APUSH project which other juniors had a month to complete. </p>
<p>I just think that seniors taking BC Calc might not have a lot of time left to cover new materials unless they remain in school well past our own graduation time. There were 4 juniors and 20 seniors in my S’s AP-Physics class plus my S who was in 8th grade. The class was allowed to just end right after the exam. My S still had 6 weeks of school.</p>
<p>In our h.s. once the AP exams are over, the class is pretty much over too. After S took the AB Calc. exam, his class spent the last weeks of school tutoring freshmen math classes for their exams.</p>
<p>I think my daughter’s best option may be to take Pre-Calc at our local community college (if we can work that out) and take the full year AB/BC sequence next year, powers that be permitting of course. Her school does the 4x4 block and most AP classes do run the full year. The second semester just started so it wouldn’t work to start a subject now and take the AP exam in May. If they gave AP exams at the end of June when school ends here it might be a different story. </p>
<p>Any thoughts on how colleges evaluate kids who have this type of schedule? Given the yearly gym and other non-AP requirements, it’s impossible to have the five or six AP courses each year that some kids on CC have. They end up with less AP classes in number but study the classes in greater depth, or at least have longer class discussions. I could see colleges counting the second semester as redundant, but I don’t know any way around it given the calendar year.</p>
<p>Momoffour: A solid foundation in Pre-calc is absolutely crucial to doing well in calculus, so I think your plan is a good one.</p>
<p>As for the number of APs, I don’t think one needs 5 or 6 per year. Plenty of students get admitted with fewer or even none into the most selective schools.</p>
<p>As long as she takes the “most rigorous course load” for her school, then she should be fine. So whatever is generally the most number of APs kids takes, if she is taking that they should be evaluating her in the context of the school.</p>
<p>Do they have to do gym all four years? Here we only do it freshmen and sophomore year. The reason that people can take six APs usually seems to be that that requirement is lifted after two years or three. If it isn’t though, then colleges should see that and understand that she didn’t have space for another AP. I don’t think colleges would penalize her for it being redundant since she can’t really do anything about the scheduling. Maybe talk to the counselor and see what the best options are? Or sometimes depending, parents of older students that you know will have better advice.</p>
<p>our school, also on block schedule, only offers Calc BC, and goes thru the AB material during the first semester year. BC is not very difficult for a student with a strong foundation in pre-calc.</p>
<p>fwiw: Our typical math sequence: Alg I, Geom, Alg II, Pre-calc, and Calc BC. Of course, nearly every student taking Calc senior year completed Alg I and/or Geom in middle school.</p>
<p>I would recommend AB before BC, I’ve made several posts about it if you care to look. Overall, I feel like I’ve had a better experience in BC than the kids who skip AB (ie on this forum and other near-by schools). I also feel I’ve learned the material better. BTW, I earned a 5 on AB last year, and am most probably getting a 5 this year <em>knock on wood.</em> BC is repetitive, but so is Alg II once you’ve had Alg I, but there are still differences.</p>
<p>YMMV but at our school doing pre-calc as a summer school course is very doable. My son thought precalc could easily have been a semester long course.</p>
<p>Life:</p>
<p>I’m not sure anyone skips AB per se (except those with Newtonian faculties). As an earlier poster mentioned, the standard Calc text covers AB material in Chapters 1-6/7 and BC material in Chapters 7+. There is no doubt that covering Chapters 1-14 in one academic year is more challenging than over two years, but, then again, most colleges will cover that same material in one year or LESS.</p>