A Nice Tool for Student Responses

I’ve been using Socrative in my classes more and more lately. It is an online polling tool that lets me post a question or problem, and my students can anonymously respond. It’s very flexible – you can offer multiple choice, true/false, short answer, etc. Here’s a screenshot:

They love using it, and I get immediate feedback on how many students understand what we’re learning, and how many need some extra practice. It works with smartphones as well as laptops.

It’s Fundamentally Calculus

I know, cheesy title, but I couldn’t think of anything else. Anyway, we’ve hit a milestone in our Calculus class – this is the point in the syllabus where we learn about The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus. It’s actually pretty incredible: this one theorem establishes the connection between derivatives, integrals, and limits. What a wonderful thing.