For the last few years, Susanne Feldman, Fair Grove High School math teacher, has taken her calculus class to participate in the derivative bee hosted at MSU. This year she decided to host Fair Grove’s own derivative bee.
This event was kept smaller than most as it was Fair Grove’s first year hosting. It was attended by calculus students from Buffalo and Fair Grove. The event took place on December 1st in Mrs. Feldman’s classroom. In order to participate you had to be currently enrolled in a calculus class. Feldman commented, “In the past we’ve been competing against larger schools and students who have had over a year’s worth of experience in Calc whereas we are just one quarter into Calc.”
A student from the Buffalo High school team ranked first in individual placements, taking the $15 reward. Despite this, Fair Grove’s team ranked first in team placement, averaging eight out of ten questions correctly per round and taking home the “G.O.A.T.” (greatest of all time) trophy.
According to Feldman there’s quite a bit that goes into planning an event like this. She explained, “I [had] to come up with problems of a variety of difficulty and their solutions, [and] get them typed into a powerpoint so it can be displayed for the students competing. I [also] prepped papers for students that [had] designated spots for their answers, etc…”
Questions were shown on the board and students had time to work them out before the answer was shown. If the student believed they answered correctly they were to raise their hand and a moderator would come check it and put a sticker on the answer sheet if it was correct. Moderators included Fair Grove’s math department (Feldman, Michael Van Cleave, and Nikki Kisling) as well as the Buffalo High School calculus teacher. The moderators timed, graded, supervised and helped with the set up of the event.
During the event there were different rounds, each with a specific amount of questions. Students were given a time limit for each round and based on the number of questions answered correctly were either eliminated or moved on to the next round. There were three rounds before moving onto the final four where it became single elimination.
Feldman said that these competitions are pretty difficult and advanced. She remarked, “…Students have to have over 20 derivative rules and formulas memorized and the problems can have multiple rules applied in any given problem.”
Several students in Feldman’s class decided to participate in the derivative bee including Carlen Lepold (12). Lepold, who has previously attended a math contest, claimed that the Derivative Bee was very similar. Lepold said this event wasn’t as hard as she thought it would be and elaborated, “It definitely showed what areas I need to study more. For example I can… just fine but I had trouble with… Now I know.”
Feldman shares that she plans on hosting this event at Fair Grove again in the future, hoping to watch it grow with time and more preparation.
