Consider inviting (requiring!) your calculus students as consultants to a visiting client in your classroom. Take a regular textbook problem, make it into a consulting opportunity (e.g., optimization problem), have a colleague or "act it out yourself" serve as a consultant. Then after interviewing the client have students write up two reports (1) one for the client with specific instructions to address the problem or situation and (2) a report to the Senior Consultant in which they offer details of modeling and analysis. This never fails in may respects - reinforces and uses good mathematics, addresses a real problem, demands students extract relevant information from the client to learn the essence of a problem, and gives opportunities for writing about the mathematical results to different audiences. Try it, you (and your student) will like it.
And while you are at SIMIODE, learn about modeling-first instruction in differential equations and some calculus applications.
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Brian Winkel
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