Abstract: We propose an extended box method which
turns out to be a variant of standard finite element methods
in the case of pure diffusion and an extension of backward
differencing to irregular grids if only convective transport
is present. Together with the adaptive orientation proposed
in a recent paper and a streamline ordering of the unknowns,
this discretization leads to a highly efficient adaptive
method for the approximation of internal layers in the case
of large local Peclet numbers.