Skipped Trig in HS. What do I need to study for Calc II?

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

<p>So at my HS, I was allowed to skip Trig and go straight to Calc 1 because of my ACT score. I will be taking Calc II in the fall at U of I, and I hear that some Trig concepts are very important to know for Calc II. What should I study the rest of the summer so that I am prepared? I don’t really have time to study every concept in Trig…</p>

2

<p>I think your HS has a rather silly policy. Doing well on the ACT or the SAT II Math has very little in common with how well you know upper-secondary school algebra, geometry, and trigonometry. That said, that isn’t your fault. But contact your high school and tell them they should think about changing that policy.</p>

<p>Make sure you know your basic SOHCAHTOA, trig identities, and possibly polar coordinate theory. Watch a couple videos from [MIT</a> OpenCourseWare | Mathematics | 18.01 Single Variable Calculus, Fall 2006 | Home](<a href=“http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/18-01-single-variable-calculus-fall-2006/]MIT”>Single Variable Calculus | Mathematics | MIT OpenCourseWare) starting around halfway through. If you can follow everything, you’re in good shape.</p>

3

<p>Thanks for your input! I agree that the policy makes absolutely no sense. I mean seriously, the ACT Math has only 4 trig questions on it. But then again I have been perfectly fine without it through Calc I. </p>

<p>I’m good with with the very basics like sohcahtoa, but I’ll definitely delve into those other two topics. Thanks again!</p>

4

<p>Trig is needed for most of the integrals in calc II, and calc II is at least 50% integration. As TuftsStudent said, pretty much all of the identities should be known, especially double-angle (and all the different ways to write it) and half-angle. The pythagorean identities, the unit circle, inverse trig functions, etc. It’s a fun class but I couldn’t imagine doing it without knowing trig.</p>

5

<p>I’ve just started self studying Calc I and I’m seeing trig all over the place. I’m guessing you just skipped the questions that had to do with the trig functions/identities?</p>

6

<p>mark - All right good to know, thanks. Sounds like I’m gonna have to go pretty in-depth. And, pardon me, but did you say “fun”? :stuck_out_tongue: </p>

<p>Inmotion - Our Calc textbook avoided trig altogether. I don’t know if that’s a good or bad thing. We got to integration by parts.</p>