Feeling very bad for ds.

[Catherine]

My junior is taking AP Calculus BC this year through PA Homeschoolers. It's been a really wonderful course-the teacher is very helpful and responsive, very experienced, and he's been doing very very well....until about the middle of the second semester. Now they are doing daily review for the AP exam and he is bombing every one of the reviews. He loves math. It's the only AP he has taken (he'll be away all of his senior year in Germany) and until a month ago it seemed certain he would do very well on the exam. To be honest, I am considering not having him take the test. And I KNOW he is feeling awful.

 

I'm just not sure what the problem is. He has ADD. I think we have underestimated how much this affects him. His errors tend to be mixing up the order of a rule, or things of that nature. I know there's no way I can pursue a time accommodation for him now but I think I will try. But how could he have done SO well for the first 8 months of the course? I don't get it.

 

Any other thoughts?

[Susan C.]

My ds failed Calculus 2 in college, and barely passed Calculus 1.... It was hard to watch. I really thought my ds was a math/science guy, but it caused him to change to an English major, and he likes that much better. The math just hit too hard and fast for him. Your ds may have hit a developmental block, and maybe in a year or two, he will get it. If you have to make this year work, then would a tutor help?

 

Dh knows a lot of people through work that failed Calculus all the way through college, and had to retake them until passing. They still got Engineering degrees. So all is not lost.

 

I looked at ds's books, ugh, calculus is hard!! :)

[Catherine]

Calculus IS hard. I can't believe I have a child capable of understanding any of it, much less mastering it. I am bursting with pride that he has done so well until now and worked so hard on this class. It makes me sad for him that he might not do well on the AP. But, life is not all sweetness. He'll be OK.

[Susan C.]

I know he is disappointed :(

 

He will have many more opportunities for it. With my oldest, I was so stressed out, thinking I had to get him ready for calculus as a freshman. I didn't have a community college to help me with homeschooling, and so it was ds, me, and the dvd player..... Then, we get to the college, and they say that even engineer majors sometimes have to start with college algebra..... wish I had known that earlier!

[Joan in GE]

Why don't you have him take just the AB test?

 

Or if you can't change, I have heard that you get the AB score even from taking the BC test. You could PM someone whose dc have done this exam like Kathy in Richmond or others to check..

[Catherine]

She responded immediately with a study guide that she's not yet shared with the class. I think it will be very helpful. Thanks for the ideas, Joan and Susan. I realize this is not earth-shattering-but it feels that way to him.