Making Calculus Concepts Concrete with 3D Manipulatives Course Redesign to Improve Student Concept Retention

Our goal is to improve (i) student comprehension of concepts from calculus, and (ii) student's skill with application of these concepts to various types of problems. The technology-enhanced method we propose is the incorporation of 3D manipulatives which illustrate these ideas. Many fundamental ideas in calculus involve idealized curves, surfaces, and solids which are unfamiliar to beginning calculus students, and an inability to visualize these objects can hamper student success. Providing a kinesthetic learning avenue for nonvisual learners will help develop intuition and, later on, technical precision.