Help me diagnose what "type" dd is, to match her with an algebra text...

[Robin in Tx]

Y'all have been so patient with me, and I appreciate it more than you know!

 

After posting over and over here, I've decided to let dd go into algebra as soon as we finish Saxon 8//7. No "pre-algebra" year inbetween. Decision made.

 

Personally, I love Saxon and prefer to stay with it. Dd doesn't particularly like math, but she is comfortable with Saxon and isn't asking to switch. Math is a point of contention between us, though... she definitely doesn't *like* it (but then again she doesn't like to work, period), and it sometimes takes her way too long to get through a problem set (drifting attention, etc). I really do want to make sure our Algebra I choice will be the best fit for her, since I'd like to avoid switching publishers during the algebra sequence.

 

 

Okay... all that being said... here is the clue. I have been teaching dd to work neatly on graph paper, and my logical mind wants each problem separated by plenty of white space and/or nice straight lines clearly delineating one problem's work from another's... nice and neat and orderly (instead of work snaking all around the page and visually getting confused with other work). Last night she gives me her homework, and she had actually done each problem in it's own contained place as I asked, and she had drawn lines around/between each problem's work... but they weren't straight lines - they were bubbles, and she had grouped them in clusters such that the final product was a picture of a flower with a different problem worked out on each petal of the flower. And there wasn't much order, either... problem 17 might be upper left hand corner, and problem 18 center right.

 

What do you do with a child like this? Do I allow her this or force her to be more structured? Is this evidence that the child needs a program like Jacobs instead of Saxon? She does lean towards a preference for music and literature, and is sorta dreamy and social, and actually a bit on the lazy side. I have NEVER understood the learning style designations well enough to place her in a category...she seems to have traits from all styles... she is auditory, but other than that I'm clueless.

 

If you have any suggestions, I would appreciate hearing them!

 

Thanks,

Robin

[forty-two]

Honestly, I think the flower thing is so very cool!

 

I'm an amazingly logical person, and I don't arrange my work in straight lines and with lots of white space. I'm more of a do the problem, draw a squiggly line around it, and so on. I hate wasting paper, so my goal was to use no more than one page per assignment, so not much white space, but I did box each answer and draw lines between each problem, but they were rarely straight. This has never held me back, so I think that, as long as your daughter is getting the correct answer and showing her work well enough, to let it slide. If grading is hard because of the lack of numerical order of the problems, you might have her write just the problem number and the answer in a list on the side or another sheet of paper for easy grading. (Or just let her grade her own, and show you the results.)

 

As for selecting an algebra text, I'd recommend you making a list of which ones you find acceptable, and find a way for your daughter to look at them (library or conventions or online samples or whatnot) and let her choose which one she likes the best.

[Jann in TX]

You know...your dd used the same approach on her homework paper as I suggest to students who are struggling. By NOT being so tidy and neat she is freeing up(stimulating) the right side of the brian--so it can work together with the left side.

 

I also suggest that these students work on the back of scratch paper---colored junk mail works great (some even use colored pencils too). The 'rules' are that you cannot start at the top and work towards the bottom. Problems MUST be randomly placed--and oriented on the page. Circle the WHOLE problem and label it when it is done.

 

The main difference is that I also have the students re-copy their work in standard form. For students with dysgraphia--their parents usually copy the work for them.

 

If her work is clear to read--even in the 'flower format' then at least have her copy her answers in a nice neat sequence on a fresh sheet of paper.

[Barb_]

Okay, take this with a huge helping of salt because I really don't know whether there is an answer to your question. But growing up, I was the scattered one. When we cleaned out our desks (old fashioned ones with the hole under the seat) at the end of the school year I had a mountain of papers, wrappers, food...ugh it was disgusting. My papers were a disaster as well. Then we had a scary 3rd grade math teacher. Looking back, this teacher was probably the best one I had in the grade school years, but she was very rigid and wanted things done only one way. We were all terrified of her, so I learned to set my papers up the way you describe.

 

I've come to believe, that with Math at least, an organized paper is conducive to an organized mind. Or at the very least, it's easier to read :) Anyway, I tell my kids, Math is perfect. There are shades of grey in every other area of life, but Math is black and white and precise. I like their papers to reflect that, no matter their natures.

 

As for a Math program, if you were both overjoyed with Saxon, I'd say to stick with it. But I'm hearing that while you're both comfortable, she's not loving it so much. You could try Jacobs, but then I'm thinking it may drive *you* crazy with its chattiness. Try to get your hands on it and go through it before committing. Have you looked at Lials? It's very step by step, but easy to feel the progress. I used it with a girl I used to tutor. She was an extrovert, a little on the lazy side, messy, but surprisingly solid with Math once she could see she was learning something new. I think that's the biggest problem with Saxon...it's difficult for a student to detect her own learning sometimes.

 

Barb

[Robin in Tx]

Yeah, it was pretty cool. I didn't criticize it - not at all!

 

You have definitely described her well... she doesn't like taking more than one piece of paper to do her work, so she crams and she starts writing very small, and then she starts making careless errors because she isn't lining things up properly and her handwriting is sloppy and she's too lazy to sharpen her pencil. Sigh... Half the time she can't follow her own work when looking for where her mistake was made.

 

Yes, grading is very hard, and she's not getting the right answer because the way she works is conducive to lots of careless errors. She understands the material well, but this is REALLY holding her back. I found some of her math papers from a couple of years ago and they were much neater and more organized than the work she does now. I think that this is more of a boredom, drudgery thing... or perhaps a teenage "why do I have to do this" thing.

 

She does not respond well to punishment/consequences. She actually responds best to incentives. I'm fresh out of ideas for incentives...

 

I think you have a good idea... showing her the alternative courses. But I would still like to know what sort of "personality" or "learning" style/type this falls under so I can better understand why one might be a better decision than another.

 

Thanks for your input!

Robin

 

ETA: I think you might be on to something... letting it slide as long as she is getting the right answer and her work is clear enough. Maybe I need to let off the actual form she is using and tell her she can do as she pleases as long as her work is legible, easy to follow, and accurate. Maybe that will be incentive enough. I'll try that... thanks so much!

[Robin in Tx]

Okay, this is very helpful. I think I will have her copy her answers in a nice, neat sequence as you suggest, and tell her that when she gets something wrong, I will have her recopy her work on a new sheet of paper in a neat manner, to help find her mistake. Usually it is a careless error due to sloppiness. Sometimes, though, it is because she skipped writing a step down because she did the step mentally and didn't check her work.

 

Thanks so much!

Robin

[readwithem]

E is the same way Robin - Oh my word her papers were a huge mess but they're on one page :)

 

One thing that helped was I made her "grade" the papers with me, after a few days so her work was "cold" in her mind - and she could see what a mess her work was!!

 

Also I have had her just circle the answer so I could find it - granted as we've moved up the actual work has become more and more important - but that made the grading part of my life much easier.

 

Next year she's taking Precalc online - it will he *really* interesting to see how the students submit their work! :)

[Robin in Tx]

I've come to believe, that with Math at least, an organized paper is conducive to an organized mind. Or at the very least, it's easier to read :) Anyway, I tell my kids, Math is perfect. There are shades of grey in every other area of life, but Math is black and white and precise. I like their papers to reflect that, no matter their natures. Barb

 

See, this is the way I think, too. This is exactly what I'm trying to teach her. And I'm trying to train her to work a certain way so that she has a good chance of being successful with upper level math because she has good work habits.

 

I think I'll let her be flowery for now, but only if it is clear and neat and orderly... then I will eventually, hopefully, get her to the point where she orders things a little more logically because she needs her mental energy for the problem set, not design creation :).

 

No, I haven't looked at Lial's. It seems to be well liked, but I steered away from BCM as a prealgebra text due to some of the negatives I read about it being used in that manner (a little mature since it was designed for the older student). I just assumed that Lial's was for the very motivated, very mathy student who needed a lot of challenge and complexity. Is that not the case?

 

Thanks for your advice!

Robin

[Robin in Tx]

You know, this is what I've had to resort to... making her show me how she worked the problem on her page because I can't follow it at all. She hasn't yet seen what a mess it is, because to her it is perfectly clear what she did, but maybe I need to let more time lapse so that it isn't fresh in her mind. Good suggestion. I will definitely try that next week. I'm glad to know that a child as bright and serious as E has struggled with this, too. I'm telling you, I've needed a magnifying glass a couple of times to read her writing, she crammed it into such a small space, in the corner, turned sideways... all to avoid going to a second page! LOL

[forty-two]

Half the time she can't follow her own work when looking for where her mistake was made.

...she's not getting the right answer because the way she works is conducive to lots of careless errors. She understands the material well, but this is REALLY holding her back. I found some of her math papers from a couple of years ago and they were much neater and more organized than the work she does now.

...She does not respond well to punishment/consequences. She actually responds best to incentives. I'm fresh out of ideas for incentives...

To me, you have described the only incentive there is: her current method *is not working*, in an objective, "I am not getting the correct answer" sense. Show her her old math papers, show how she was getting more correct answers with a more organized format. Once you can get her to admit her current method is not working as well as it might - and however ornery teens might be, cold hard facts are hard to ignore (even if she won't admit it to you), especially if you approach it as you are on her side, just trying to help her find *her own* method that works. Then you can brainstorm together, trying to find a way to utilize your superior knowledge of good organization with how she prefers to do things to find a method that objectively *works*.

 

think that this is more of a boredom, drudgery thing... or perhaps a teenage "why do I have to do this" thing....But I would still like to know what sort of "personality" or "learning" style/type this falls under...

I know, for me, it was a boredom/drudgery type of thing, and a smooshing things on one page was an elementary school coping mechanism that took on a life of its own. Personality-wise, I'd say that your daughter is the sort that doesn't see a reason to do something in an externally-imposed "best" or standard way to do things unless that way can be objectively proven to be best. When it comes to learning math, I'd say that something that delves into the "why" and not just the "how" would be a good fit.

[Rhondabee]

I have to admit I've tho't my 13yo ds was just plain being stubborn. :blush:

 

Nice to hear that he's just "not like me". This mama will learn to :chillpill: one day. Though I do like the separate answer sheet idea.

 

Much thanks to all!

Rhonda

[forty-two]

...then I will eventually, hopefully, get her to the point where she orders things a little more logically because she needs her mental energy for the problem set, not design creation :).

...I just assumed that Lial's was for the very motivated, very mathy student who needed a lot of challenge and complexity. Is that not the case?

I realize your dd might not *like* math, but if, as you say, she understands all the problems with mental energy to spare, I would say she is pretty *good* at math. Lial's might be a better fit than you think.

 

Your dd seems, personality-wise, a lot like me, and now that I think about, Saxon seems to have a "Do this because I say it works" mentality, which might not be the best fit.

[Robin in Tx]

Okay, thanks. This is very helpful.

 

Robin

 

ETA: I should be completely honest, through, and say that she has been making very low scores in math recently because of all the silly careless mistakes. Only once or twice has she gotten a problem wrong because she didn't know how to solve it or set up the equation properly... it's all been because she either copied the problem wrong, read it wrong, or her sloppiness led to a careless calculation, etc. She is simply not paying attention to detail, and I think it's because she's bored out of her wits. But she loves mental math and challenging word problems. Yes, I happen to think she is VERY good at math... she really GETS it. But you'd never know it by her scores recently.

[Robin in Tx]

Okay, now I'm beginning to think that if she would do better with a program like Lial's, then maybe I should stop 8/7 now and just switch to Lial's pre-algebra... we would be spending a little more time on pre-algebra by doing it this way, but next year is only 7th grade for us so it's not like we're in any rush.

 

We're only about 1/2 way through 8/7 because we took a long break when we moved, and I had intended for her to finish it up over the summer and start algebra in the fall. We could work another month or two in 8/7, and not have gotten to it's harder prealgebra stuff, and then perhaps Lial's pre-algebra would be a better fit.

 

Then, I see that Lial's has a pre-algebra/introductory algebra combo text. Maybe this would be the better one to go with? How does one find out the difference between all the prealgebra texts that Lial offers? There's prealgebra, integrated prealgebra, and prealgebra/introductory algebra combined.

 

Yikes!

[Kathy in MD]

does a good job. My 13 yo was ignoring me on the need for neatness, also arguing that he didn't waste paper. But when a college professor on a DVD kept mentioning that most of the mistakes he saw on papers were due to sloppiness and not showing the work, ds became neater and showed his work. It also helped that the professor demonstrated neatness in every lesson.

 

The lectures are good also for understanding math. The problem is that it's a lot more expensive than Lial's :sad:

[langfam]

This is the Lial's that I got (used) for my soon-to-be 7th grader. It's been suggested to get the paperback edition of Lial's.

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0321257804

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0321279387

[Beth in SW WA]

does a good job. My 13 yo was ignoring me on the need for neatness, also arguing that he didn't waste paper. But when a college professor on a DVD kept mentioning that most of the mistakes he saw on papers were due to sloppiness and not showing the work, ds became neater and showed his work. It also helped that the professor demonstrated neatness in every lesson.

 

The lectures are good also for understanding math. The problem is that it's a lot more expensive than Lial's :sad:

 

I agree. I even scanned and emailed a copy of ds's work to Prof. Mosely so HE could be the "heavy" and tell ds he needed to work on neatness.

[karensk]

Only once or twice has she gotten a problem wrong because she didn't know how to solve it or set up the equation properly... it's all been because she either copied the problem wrong, read it wrong, or her sloppiness led to a careless calculation, etc.

 

This is sooooo familiar to me. Ds11 (5th grade), left to his own, will either (1) do most/all of the work in his head...we use Singapore Math PM-5, or (2) write out his work in a snakey, winding way that is so hard to follow, even he gets lost. Both ways often result in simple arithmetic or copying mistakes, like leaving off one numeral as he goes to the next step. I tried telling him to and even showing him how to write neatly and in order. But I could tell that he wasn't completely convinced that there was a need to convert from his way to mine.

 

So, recently, I started doing more side-by-side lesson time with him, something like this:

We sit together with the math textbook, blank paper and pencils. After discussing the lesson for the day, I tell him what his assignment is for the day. (He usually starts it in the morning and finishes it in the evening during "homework" time.) But here's what I changed: Before sending him off to start on his assignment, we do the first part together. On his paper, I work the first problem, showing every step that I want him to show. If he seems to understand, I'll let him do the next problem, making sure he shows every step properly. If he doesn't seem ready to do a whole problem on his own, I'll do little parts of the problem and have him do some other bits, like a collaboration; then he does one on his own. Whoever's doing it, I make sure every step is shown (I also have requirements for indenting certain math steps that we're working on!). Since I'm sitting right there, I talk him through each step and am able to make sure he doesn't miss one. Once it looks like he has the hang of it, I let him go off and work independently. If necessary, I'll do 6 or more problems with him, side-by-side. And then, even when I send him off to do his work, I tell him to show me his work after one or two problems, to make sure he's on the right track. If the one or two aren't done right, he has to do those over, show them to me again, and assuming those are correct, show me the next one or two problems. He can't do the entire remaining assignment until he's proved he can do at least a couple of them completely right. That way, he won't have to do over an entire assigment and I won't have to hunt & peck for his answers.

 

It seems to have helped. He's really shown improvement in showing his steps and not snaking them around the page anymore. And the number of careless mistakes due to sloppiness has gone down, too.:hurray: We're still working on the indenting thing (but I can be a bit compulsive about things like that).

 

I plan to start using Chalkdust next year (alongside PM-6) for the same reasons some others mentioned: Dr. Moseley regularly tells the students how important neatness is when it comes to showing their work, and he demonstrates it.

 

HTH!

[Storm Bay]

Well, I have a dd who hates math (even though she was ready for Algebra before she was 12) and is very messy. I was very messy but aced Algebra, so I don't think there's a correlation between being good at it and being tidy, or between being a logical thinker and being tidy. Heck, I know there isn't.

 

We've tried all sorts of Algebra books, and my dd still manages to lollygag and be messy with all of them. It's her, not the books. However, I'm learning a lot about Algebra books, the good, the bad and the ugly. My favourite is Gelfand's, but as Charon said (I'm paraphrasing) some of the problems are too hard for most 13 yos. But dd and I, leaning to the geeky side of life, enjoy the thinking and theory part of it.

 

I'm getting a couple more. She's going to, with her agreement, do a quick repeat of Algebra 1 with Dolciani because I let her cruise through Algebra 1 over 2 years so that she could do fewer problems per day and still be done Alg 1 by the end of gr. 8. I want her to have a firm mastery of the thinking and the ability to solve problems. She has an A average, but there are a couple of areas of weakness that aren't at that level. Not that I shoot just for a grade, but because she hopes to go to college on scholarships so that she doesn't have to live at home and work her way through since we don't have the money to pay her way. She's nearly 13 and this is an intense age for most, and dd was born intense. The other one I'm getting is a very cheap Foersters. Dd likes to learn from a book, so she'll have more than one to read if she gets stuck and doesn't like my way.

[Jann in TX]

My own dd is thriving with Lial's. We switched mid Saxon 8/7 and have no regrets. This dd is NOT a math person--in fact she has some learning differences and is a little on the 'slow' side. She loves the detailed lessons that the Lial texts have--and she is getting it!

 

I've also used the Lial series with VERY MATHY students. They were challenged and seemed to enjoy the texts too.

 

One thing I liked about BCM is that it showed the concept from the beginning--where most Pre-Algebra texts show it from some mid-way point (assuming prior knowledge). A few of the word problems in BCM were a bit of a stretch (wording and vocabulary) but I'm talking about a VERY FEW--most were along the lines of what my dd who attends PS had in her texts.

 

I would stay away from the "Combo" texts. These texts were designed as a quick review for community college students--who had taken these courses before. Think refresher.

[Robin in Tx]

Jann, you said your daughter switched to Lial's half way through Saxon 8/7. Just to be clear, she switched to Lial's BCM, right? If your daughter had finished 8/7 successfully, where would you have placed her in the Lial's series (I'm guessing Introductory Algebra, because I believe you've told me this before... just want to make sure).

 

I've noticed that no one uses a Lial text for geometry... for those working through the Lial's series, what is the geometry course of choice?

 

Thanks so much for all your help!

Robin

[Robin in Tx]

Karen, you've got GREAT ideas... I'm going to try them! I really like your approach and the way you work with your ds. I can see how it would help quite a bit. Thanks so much!

 

Robin

[Natalieclare]

 

she definitely doesn't *like* it (but then again she doesn't like to work, period), and it sometimes takes her way too long to get through a problem set (drifting attention, etc).

 

She does lean towards a preference for music and literature, and is sorta dreamy and social, and actually a bit on the lazy side. I have NEVER understood the learning style designations well enough to place her in a category...she seems to have traits from all styles... she is auditory, but other than that I'm clueless.

 

 

 

This describes my daughter to a T! She used Saxon 7/6, then BCM, now Algebra. She's doing great with this program. I have a few programs on the shelf for her to use as a resource should she need it, along with ALEKS, but so far Lial's and I have been all she's needed.

[karensk]

I actually adapted the idea from SWB's Writing Without Fear CD, which I listened to about 8 months ago. She described a sample copywork/dictation lesson where she's sitting/standing right next to the student, so that if he starts to spell something incorrectly or write in the wrong place, she can have him fix it right then & there. Doing the whole dictation/copywork in this manner, I realized she wouldn't have to return a page full of corrections for the student to go back & fix.

 

So, I started doing our math lessons like this about a month ago. When I can see that ds is getting the hang of it, I'll let him do more work on his own without showing me every couple of problems, etc. But if he turns in a page of work lacking the structure it's supposed to have, we go back to more side-by-side time and/or show-me-your-work-after-one-problem.

 

Hope it works out for y'all, one way or the other!

[Nan in Mass]

Myrtle just wrote a GREAT post about how to get children to show their work. It is under my post about guessing at answers, a few days back from now. You might want to check it out.

[karensk]

Myrtle just wrote a GREAT post about how to get children to show their work. It is under my post about guessing at answers, a few days back from now. You might want to check it out.

 

http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?p=137510#post137510

 

Thanks, Nan!

[SallyMac]

After many years of Handwriting Without Tears and OT visits, he is dysgraphic, so his handwriting/printing is still very difficult to read, he capitalizes a letter in the middle of a word for no reason (whether typing or writing), he sees the line on a page, but doesn't really seem to know what to do with it...yet he is intuitively great with technical things and has an artistic flair (but cannot draw!?). So I think it is a spatial relationship problem. When he is tired he makes sloppy mistakes on the simplest parts of difficult math problems...gets the difficult part and then messes up on addition or multiplication through carelessness. Several years ago I had had it, and I grabbed a wad of plain, white copy paper, made a straight vertical line down the middle and 3 to 4 horizontal lines across the paper, and three-hole punched it in a notebook. This is what I made him do his math problems on. I told him he had to circle the final answer and show all the work as he always did most of it in his head to avoid having to write. I told him then, and remind him constantly that I am not the only teacher who will have to read and decipher his answers. If a 6 looks like a 0, a non-mom teacher (college professor) will mark it wrong. BTW, my son is thriving with Lial Intermediate Algebra. He loves the fact the author bothers to explain the concepts thoroughly and that some of the problems are quite challenging. He's not crazy about science, has a love/hate relationship with English, is VERY AUDITORY (can be easily distracted by sounds, but was born with perfect pitch...former Broadway singer who can imitate any sound he hears (maybe a future sound effects man?) Does this sound like your daughter?

[Nan in Mass]

Yup. Or we tend to say something more like euh. It is well worth wading through this explaination. : )

[Jann in TX]

I had dd start with chapter 2 of BCM--she moved quickly but in most units she was able to find some problem areas--and she filled in many gaps.

 

If a student finishes Saxon 8/7 with an average of at least 90% then they are ready for just about any Algebra 1 program. If their grades are less than 90% I suggest doing some sort of review to find the problem/weak areas before moving on to Algebra--or things might snowball.

[Robin in Tx]

Yes, this sounds a lot like my dd. Sloppy handwriting. I thought girls were supposed to love to write and have pretty handwriting! Very natural musician with very good pitch. One of her violin master class teachers commented after she played a piece that she needed to tune her violin first next time. I was surprised, because her performance didn't sound out of tune to me, and he said it wasn't - that she was compensating for the out of tune string during her performance and you could only hear it on open strings... he said that there were some professionals who couldn't do that! LOL Yes. Very auditory. She remembers everything she hears. Okay, I'm convinced... we'll try Lial's.

 

Thanks!

Robin

[Robin in Tx]

THanks, Nan and Karen, for the link!

 

Robin

[Robin in Tx]

Thanks for all your help, Jann. I appreciate the time you've taken.

 

Robin