Abstract

Traditional calculus instruction, with its reliance on formal limits, often creates unnecessary barriers for management students seeking essential quantitative skills. To address these barriers, we advocate for gradual linearization, an underutilized method that replaces formal limit arguments with local linear approximations. This approach fosters deeper conceptual clarity and offers a rigorous yet accessible pathway to core concepts -- including differentiation rules and Taylor expansions -- central to marginal analysis and optimization. Adopting this limit-free approach enables management educators to equip future managers with quantitative reasoning skills for practical applications, without the detour of formal limits.

Keywords: Gradual linearization; limit-free differentiation; simple proofs in differential calculus.

DOI: 10.57016/TM-YOCJ7235

Pages:  14$-$26     

Volume  XXIX ,  Issue  1 ,  2026