My mother had a great deal of trouble finding a job after a divorce. She had not worked in two decades, so had no recent work experience, and her career, while good, was not one where the credentials were good forever -- it was one which favors recent graduates or continuing employment. She was thus overqualified for a lot of jobs (could not get a callback from Walmart, for example) while no longer qualified in the field of her degree. She does have one now, but it took going back to school to get another degree.

This might be a crazy idea, but has he tried reading the problem out loud himself? I notice with a lot of my students, they look at me with a deer-in-the-headlights look, but when I say "read the directions to me", they get halfway through and say "ohhhh nevermind"

Ok, first, the credits are weird because it's on quarters rather than semesters. This is also why the topics are split up in a bit of an unusual way. 251, 252, and 253 cover the standard material one would expect to see in calc 1-2, plus an introductory treatment of linear algebra. It does not look like it covers the full linear algebra course, but it looks like it covers most of it. 254 and 255 cover vector calculus. As far as which one your student should take, I would actually recommend contacting a professor and explaining that he wants to go to graduate school in geology, probably glaciology, and asking for a recommendation. I am not sufficiently familiar with geology to make an authoritative recommendation. My *personal* recommendation would be to take at least 253, unless he is absolutely sure he is going to State U, because this material is covered in calc 2 in many semester-based systems and this could cause issues with transfer credit. But I'm not 100% sure so you really ought to check with a geologist. ETA: And yes, you could take 253 and 254 in either order -- they're probably split that way in order to maximize flexibility in scheduling and fitting in courses, because you don't really need sequences and series for introductory vector calculus.

I'd probably get a good LA program, a good math program, and unschool the rest. It won't hurt him to spend a year just reading about stuff in history and science that interests him. btw, if he likes vikings, I recommend D'aulaire's book of Norse Myths if you haven't got it already.

Can you please either post your CC's name in the thread or PM me so that I can read the course descriptions? At some universities, calculus is split into 4 3-credit courses rather than 3 4-5 credit courses, and my gut instinct is that that is what you're running into, but I'd really like to read them before I give advice.

I would echo the others about not considering this a sign of unreadiness for algebra. I see the same problem with my university students all the time. Honestly, I think sometimes this gets worse if you just wait -- because then it's even easier and engages less of the student's brain, so they become more careless. Have you considered using a different color pencil for addition and subtraction operations? I have heard of some students having success with this.

I think splitting a lesson over two days is fine.

The biggest problem is with administrators who just want to look at the numbers and ignore the comments. I know very few people who want to do away with evaluations completely, but many who feel that the numbers are ridiculous.

Nope. But it's much, much harder to lose the weight once you reach where you're losing it for vanity rather than health (I am in the same boat myself, so please don't think I'm trashing you when I say "vanity"). Age doesn't help.

Less likely -- those aren't anonymous -- but people do do those things on job applications.

No surprises there.

Any number except zero, that is -- 0/0 is indeterminate.

Yes. The way I teach this in developmental math classes is to think about cookies. 0 divided by 4 is like splitting 0 cookies to 4 people. That works just fine mathematically, none of them get any cookies. 4 divided by 0 is like splitting 4 cookies to 0 people, which is patently ridiculous. In later classes, we explain it because division is the inverse operation to multiplication. Saying "What is 8 divided by 4?" is really saying "What number will give 8 when multiplied by 4?" or in algebraic language, 4x = 8. This works fine when we try to solve 4x = 0, but when we try to solve 0x = 4, we run into the difficulty that any number multiplied by 0 gives 0, so there is no solution to this equation.

Out of curiosity, how does she do on the AOPS "do you need this" test for beginning algebra? Have you looked into this? And what does she think about it?

I agree. ?!?!?!!!!!!

The Man who Mistook His Wife for a Hat is an awesome read. Temple Grandin's Thinking in Pictures might also be interesting. When I took psych 101 in college, I found the Myers textbook very readable and very interesting. As a matter of fact, I kept it after the class was over to re-read for fun.

ROFL at the 1-star reviews!

Quite honestly, I think there are different levels of minima (and please note that all of these apply to neurotypical children) : a) What I would consider an ideal education would be a child educated to reach their potential in at least one area (which does not have to be formally academic -- it could be musical, artistic, agricultural) while sufficiently equipped in other areas to not close doors, should they desire to pursue further education. b.) What I would consider a minimal education would be one which sufficiently equips a child to enter college-level academic or vocational classes at a community college, or an apprenticeship program, without needing developmental work. I would consider less than that neglectful -- *but* if it hit at least level c), it would not reach the level of sufficiently neglectful that I would consider reporting it. If it were someone I knew, though, I would encourage them to do better and offer all the help I could. c) What I would consider a sub-minimal education would be one that equips a child to be able to hold a low-wage job -- i.e. be able to read and understand what they read at at least the 8th grade level, be able to do mathematics with the aid of a calculator to at least the pre-algebra level, especially including counting change. I would consider less than this not just neglectful, but abusive. While I would start out encouragingly and attempting to problem-solve, if push came to shove and the parents were resistant to teaching basic math and reading, this is something I would report. (note that this would require a neurotypical child to be at least four grades behind grade level).

I like just responding with "I'm 8" (or however old)

This is exactly what books like Lial's BCM (and any other college developmental arithmetic text) are written for.

They have all these great, fascinating, awesome courses in english, science, and history -- and then the math options are all calculus, statistics, or programming. Where's the number theory? cryptography? history of math? logic? bah.

I do think the kid matters somewhat. A bright kid who is at least not non-mathy is going to pick a lot of stuff up just from being around it, just like some kids are natural readers and spellers and easily pick it up without any sort of curriculum. It works beautifully for some. I also still think that the parent has to be at least educated enough to discuss it -- just like even a natural reader is going to have more difficulties (I am NOT saying it can't be done) learning to read if their mum never has any reading material in the house, but only watches television. So I think that if the parent is not confident around basic arithmetic, advocating that they eliminate a curriculum and use only living math could be a bad idea. I don't like that they seem to be claiming that a curriculum is bad, I really don't. FWIW, I didn't have formal math before we started (concurrently) a book very similar to BCM and hands-on equations, and it worked beautifully for me, but I have seen it work quite badly for others. All of this blather could be summed up as "keep an eye on your kid and what's working for them -- and if it's NOT working, CHANGE"

Well, you included a lot more information than I did :D Now, bee, you've been struggling with proofs this semester (this is VERY VERY common in the first proof class) -- you might consider one of the free textbooks on proof here: http://aimath.org/textbooks/approved-textbooks/ I think some of the notes on writing and organizing proofs in Sundstrom's book might be especially useful. Also, when they tell you your proofs are wrong, is there a "model solution" for you to compare to? I write these for my students when more than a certain percent of the class makes a terrible hash of a problem. Also, do you have a study group?

Quite honestly, anything that says "no x before age y because their little minds just can't handle it" sticks in my craw. Kids are ready for the same thing at different ages. Now, as far as not doing formal math with a curriculum before a certain stage of readiness, I think it'll work just fine if whichever parent is doing the educating is aware of mathematics in daily life and makes an effort to discuss it. I don't think it would take very long to learn the pencil-and-paper algorithms for arithmetic for someone who's good at mental computations with small numbers. I doubt, though, that it's necessary to follow this route, and it seems like a lot more work than just finding a curriculum that's a good fit for both of you.

I am so utterly thankful the law disagrees with you. ETA: If you don't want to get quoted, deleting your posts will probably work.