<p>I'm in a dilemma now, debating whether to take AP Calculus AB or BC next year. I've never been particularly strong in math, although I have gotten A's in school (Honors Geometry, Honors Algebra II, Honors Pre-Calculus) and placed in BC in the calculus placement test (which was too easy to determine anything). Like, I have trouble understanding concepts and cannot figure new things out unless they are explained to me clearly but after that, I completely grasp it. </p>
<p>I'm also taking AP Lit, AP French, AP Chem, and possibly AP Psych next year and would just be afraid that 3 hours of AP Calc BC work/struggling with it would be too much as I have a TON of extracurriculars and classes on weekends, etc. Also, our school's grading scale is very harsh and I have to prepare for the SAT/PSAT next year. </p>
<p>This year, I took Honors Chem, Honors French 4, Honors English, Honors PreCalc, AP Euro, AP USH and others and had straight A's.</p>
<p>What do you think I should do? Could I handle AP Calc BC? Thanks!</p>
<p>Have you been exposed to derivatives in your honors precalc class? To put things in perspective, my Calc BC class has finished covering integrals while the AB class seems to have just started on the topic. If you know derivatives very well, I would recommend taking Calc BC because you'll be ready to tackle integration, which is a bit harder.</p>
<p>You would probably be putting the same amount of work into AB as BC; from a workload perspective. BC just moves a little faster.</p>
<p>I took AB last year (5), and am taking BC this year. I felt like i should have taken BC last year already, because BC is not that much harder.
I also got all A's in math, but was never particularly strong in math, but once something is explained to me i grasp it very well</p>
<p>I think that taking either would be fine, if you're thinking of majoring in something like engineering where you will most likely need calc, it would probably be good to take BC.</p>
<p>But if you are thinking of majoring in something more like social studies for example, just taking AB calc is a great way of getting that GE req out of the way.</p>
<p>According to College Board's topic outline, the group of topics covered in AB is a subset of the topics covered in BC. The major difference is Calc BC also includes a section on series. Since more material is covered in the same period of time, you should expect a faster pace in BC than in AB.</p>
<p>One other consideration is the distribution of scores on the two exams. For the exams taken in 2007, approximately 50% received a score of 3 or higher on the AB test while 80% received a score of 3 or higher on the BC test (40% received a 5).</p>
<p>Keep in mind that there are two reasons why students score better on the BC exam than the AB exam:</p>
<p>(1) If students have an opportunity to take AB and then take BC, their knowledge of calculus will be greater entering the BC course.</p>
<p>(2) If students don't have that opportunity, then generally smarter students will opt to select BC while generally weaker students will opt to select AB.</p>
<p>paki 786: not hard at all
if u are a decent math student, u will not need precalc at all and even if u had it wouldnt help that much. the only topics IMO that would have helped are polar graphing...which isnt until calc BC anyways.</p>
<p>yeah im thinking of only AP Calc AB...yea i have had all A's in Algebra 1 and
2, Geometry, next year i will take Trig (junior year), and then senior AP Calc. </p>
<p>many others say that pre-calc is highly recommended.......i just dont want to struggle like crazy.</p>
<p>thanks. that is why i am taking trig in my junior year and then AP calc AB in my senior.........i just do not know whether to take pre-calc with trig next year for AP Calc prep</p>
<p>The main difference with AB and BC is that BC test questions are generally a little harder, in addition to there being a little more material. If you're looking to be science-heavy take BC but if you're not terribly interested and taking more than two other APs do AB. Also, the teacher is very important in your decision.</p>
<p>The content questions on the AB exam and BC exam are of equivalent difficulty when dealing with the same topic.</p>
<p>The reason why some of the BC topics may seem harder is that you sometimes have more approaches from which to choose (for instance, the BC exam, you may have integration by parts or by partial fractions to choose from, whereas on the AB exam, these aren't considerations).</p>
<p>I took BC junior year with 2 other APs (APUSH and APLAC) and all other honors classes (that’s the most rigorous schedule my school allows juniors to have) </p>
<p>BC is totally manageable. I also do a bunch of ECs, so I thought I’d die, but Calculus is beautiful. Take BC!</p>