Math 184 Section 201
Differential Calculus for Commerce and the Social Sciences
Online Course Material 

NEWS
Final Exam is scheduled for April 25 at 12:00 in room HEBB 100.

Try Final Exam Information .

Math Learning Centre will be open 9:30am-7:30pm Tuesday April 22 through Thursday April 24. I will make myself available for a number of hours Wednesday April 23 and Thursday April 24 and will post that information here when the timing becomes more definite. Copies of some old Math 104-184 exams are posted on the departmental website exams . and click on past exams. The Math Club has some packages with some exams and solutions for sale in the Math Club in Math Annex 1119. The hours can be found at Math Club.

Cookie recipe
Test 4 results: 62% average and 63% median. Test 4 Solutions . Test 4 is scheduled for Friday March 28. Covers all materials up to and including Mar 26 lecture. New material covered since the last midterm includes optimization problems and linear approximations. The test will not cover quadratic approximations but could cover the quadratic error term if we get there on Wednesday (I doubt we will get there).

Test 3 results: 56% average and 54% median. At this stage I am not ready to propose a fixed scaling for this test. The higher grades (80% and higher) do not need to be scaled. Test 3 Solutions . The grades in the 45-55 range need help! But I am hoping for good results on test 4. Test 3 was scheduled for Monday March 10 (had been scheduled for Friday March 7) to avoid the ECON midterm on Friday. Covers all materials up to and including Mar 7 lecture. New material covered since the last midterm includes elasticity (see notes), related rates, maxima and minima of a function and curve sketching. Note that I can expect you to know derivatives of sin(x) and cos(x) as well volume of a sphere of radius r and the area of a sphere of radius r and the area of a circle of radius r as well as perimter of a circle of radius r. Of course also the volume of a box and area of a triagle. If we need more specialized formulas (e.g. volume of a cone or height h and radius r) then we will give them in a question. Basics of similar triagles are expected.


Test 2 results: 60% average and 62% median. I will be scaling up scores near the middle of the distribution by 5%. Higher scores will not be affected as much. Test 2 Solutions . Covers all materials up to and including Feb 12 lecture. It will include all the differentiation rules (power rule, product rule, quotient rule, and chain rule). We discussed the interpretations of a derivative as a rate of change. We considered how to get tangent lines and related problems. We considered minimizing average cost (the average cost is minimized when the average cost is equal to the marginal cost). We used implicit differentiation in a number of contexts. We considered exponential growth as well as regular compount interest contrasted with continuos compounding. I indicated that we will not have a question on Intermediate Value Theorem nor we will have a question on elasticity. We could now ask a question on continuous and differeential functions (see question 3 on October 14, 2011 test). You can of course speculate on what my focus will be on the test and of course more recent topics are likely to be more emphasized. We certainly can ask questions from topics studied earlier in the course. Weakness in basic algebra can dramatically reduce your success. The test will be 55 minutes. Arrive early so we can start on time. Normal test rules apply including no cellphones, Backpacks under your seat etc.

Test 1 results: 65% average and 68% median. Test 1 Solutions . Test 1 syllabus: Business problems involving p,q,R,C,P; Exponential and Logarithms; Limits including some elementary examples using e; Limit definition of the derivative; simple application of derivative rules including power rule and product rule. No quotient rule or chain rule for this test. There are quite a few new computational techniques so far in the course. Weakness in basic algebra can dramatically reduce your success. The test will be 55 minutes. Arrive early so we can start on time. Normal test rules apply including no cellphones, Backpacks under your seat etc.


As part of MATH 184, Peer Assisted Study Sessions (PASS) will be held every Monday 5:00-6:00 in LSK 462 (Note the time change) for the duration of the course. In Peer Assisted Study Sessions, you will be provided with techniques to effectively learn the material covered in the course, as well as receive targeted support in areas you find particularly challenging. It is highly recommended that you attend Peer Assisted Study Sessions in order to achieve success in this course. The PASS Leader for Math 184 is Semih Sezer, a 3rd-year student who was successful in Math 184 in his first year at UBC and has since led Math 184 PASS sessions for three sections of Math 184 since January, 2013. You can find the session times/locations here: Pass website .

General help is available in the Math Learning Centre in LSK 301 and 302.

Sauder is offering student tutoring (for the B.Com students) Tuesday and Thursday 11-1 in the Sauder Library (CLC Canaccord Learning Commons). A special midterm prep workshop is offered next Thursday the 13th from 5-6pm. Students can RSVP online through the workshops function of the Sauder COOL website. For the few non-Sauder students you are reminded of AMS tutoring as well.

Students can get help from me during office hours 1:30-2:30 MWF (MATH ANNEX 1114) and most weeks 4:30-5:30 Thursday in MATH ANNEX 1118 (or other times I am available).

Warren Code dropped by our class to discuss a Connect resource for students who need help with background material: Preparation for Calculus. Here is his description: In the main Courses tab in Connect, there is a "Course Catalog" box with a "Browse Course Catalog" button; if you search there for "preparation for calculus" it is the only hit . . . mousing over the course ID gives the enroll option from the little arrow/circle. Unfortunately, a direct link to enrollment or to the course is not possible (thanks, Blackboard!).
There are two delivery versions of the review material, which are the same material but that behave differently in different browsers. The "mobile" version seems to display everything and is decent on iOS/Safari, but I haven't gotten an Android test in yet. But it will not display much at all in Firefox (the main sticking point is the math type display), so I've included the "desktop" alternative. The webwork practice is a bunch of timed tests, primarily drawing from a U Michigan bank we obtained. There are instructions at the very bottom of the lists of tests about how to interpret the diagnostic test score (the plan is to automate this and have a fancy Connect display in version 2 of the course). (end of Warren's description)

Lectures 3-4 Monday, Wednesday and Friday (never forget Fridays!) in LSK 200

I will generally follow the syllabus of last term Weekly Outline:. etc.

Solutions to workshops will be posted after the workshops are over for the week at Workshop Solutions website .

Handouts or activities specific to this section will appear below.

We intend to have four term tests (50 minutes) in class on Fridays. The dates are: January 24, February 14, March 7 and March 28. These are fixed dates. If you have problems with these contact me in the first week of classes otherwise treat these as final exams with a fixed date and time.  Note that the best 3 out of 4 will count to your grade. The final exam schedule is not prepared until much later in the term and again the date scheduled for our final exam is not flexible.
I arrive most days by 9:30. I teach MATH 441 on Tuesdays and Thursdays 2:00-3:30. I typically do not read my email from home (i.e. evenings and weekends).


COURSE MATERIALS

Course Outline: grading scheme etc. 

Business/Economics problem for p,q,R,C,P. 

Business/Economics problem for p,q,R,C,P that was given on a test and worth 17 marks out of 100 for a 50 minute test. 

A similar Business/Economics problem for p,q,R,C,P. 

How the Exponential and Logarithm rules are related.  

How we can define an exponential function by limits.  

How the product rule and chain rule follow from the idea that functions that are differentiable are locally linear.  

Differentiable functions are locally linear; they are approximated by the linear tangent line extremely well.  

Differentiation rules applied.  

The derivatives of R,C,P.  

Some notes on continuous compounding.   Some interest problems.   Solutions.  

Notes on elasticity. Problems on elasticity. Solutions.  

Related Rates Problems. Solutions.  

Some general and interesting, but somewhat harder, problems. (from Andrew Adler)  

A short description of curve sketching   (I'd recommend some examples perhaps from the text in sections 4.2, 4.3.  

Optimization problems.   Solutions.  

Runner Problem   and the intermediate value theorem.  

A number of you referred to difficulties with the algebra in the shrinking circle problem. Kelly Paton, another instructor posted a solution to shrinking circle problem  

Here are some practice tests. ALWAYS use practice tests by doing the problems without looking at solutions. Then afterwards compare your answers with solutions if you like. Reading solutions is unlikely to be of any help in studying. I am posting the four tests I gave in 2006. You have to decide which questions are relevant given the order of topics we have followed. Certain topics will likely be absent such as Newton's Method. Test 1, Solutions, Test 2, Solutions, Test 3, Solutions, Test 4, Solutions.

sample test Note date; about 1 week before our test 2.

sample test Note date; about 1 week before our test 2.

Test given last term by me. Note date; about 1 week after our test 2. The last question on related rates is unlikely to be on the syllabus of our test 2 this term. Solutions

mock midterm Note date; closer to our test 3. solutions