Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam by Mark Howell


Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam
Title : Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam
Author :
Rating :
ISBN : 0972705554
ISBN-10 : 9780972705554
Language : English
Format Type : Hardcover
Number of Pages : 397
Publication : First published December 15, 2004

Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam is your indispensable guide to scoring well on either the AB or BC AP Calculus. This book features an outstanding team of authors and practice exam contributors: veteran AP Calculus teachers who have served on the AP Calculus Test Development Committee and are College Board consultants, exam grading leaders, and AP award recipients. The book expands Skylight's Be Prepared series, and it is crafted with the same care, attention to detail, and respect for the student as our

Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam Reviews

  • James Carter

    Compared to The Princeton's Review: Cracking the AP Calculus AB & BC Exams and Peterson's Master the AP Calculus AB & BC, Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam is the hardest book of the three although I haven't worked on Barron's yet.

    Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam is so hard that I had a serious time trying to survive the free response questions in the practice exams at the end of the book. I have to say these questions were an overkill for such a high school student with little to some mathematical maturity.

    While I did learn a lot out of the book, the brevity of the solutions kills me and is just plain annoying. The explanations are so compact that the authors could have expanded it a bit more due to the space wasted in the pages. The details are highly technical, making it suitable for those who have mastered Calculus and need one more extra step to top it off. Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam is really that book.

    But be forewarned, it is a very difficult book to walk through, and the practice exams do give a headache. After working through every single problem in the book, I can honestly say Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam will definitely get anyone ready for the actual exam.

    However, if you are not really all attuned to the subject of Calculus, I recommend first The Princeton's Review: Cracking the AP Calculus AB & BC Exams because it's very basic, painless, and user-friendly. Then, work your way up to Peterson's Master the AP Calculus AB & BC along with The Humongous Book of Calculus Problems. Next up will be Barron's AP Calculus. Finally, get into Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam for the sake of completeness.

    All in all, Be Prepared for the AP Calculus Exam could use more expansion in the solutions in terms of pedagogy, but the difficulty level is pretty good.

    Errata
    Pg. 261, #11: it is not E. It is A because u = 4 - x^2 gives the derivative du = -2xdx. Then (-1/2)du = dx. After substitution, you will find it leads to -k/2, not k/2.

    Pg. 263, #21: There is an error on the y-axis as the lines of positive slope are missing on it.