Algebra II from "The Great Courses"

[Bostonian]

My eldest son is in elementary school but has studied some Algebra. I am thinking purchasing the Algebra II course from "The Great Courses" -- for a short time it costs only $80+shipping . There are 18 hours of videos plus a 300-page workbook. I wonder if anyone has tried this course. Alternatives I am considering are algebra courses from the Art of Problem Solving, EPGY, and Thinkwell.

 

He is young enough that we can go over Algebra II more than once. It's less important that the course be rigorous than that it keep his interest.

[onaclairadeluna]

I would enthusiastically recommend AOPS!:D

[regentrude]

We are using AoPS. Very rigorous, challenging and fun. The author did math olympiads and approaches math as something that is tremendous fun - and you feel that joy on every page. It's a discovery based approach which is great for kids who love, and are good at, math.

 

If you consider the online class: from what I hear it is VERY fast paced- may not work for a young student. My DS is taking AoPS algebra 1 in 6th grade, and we just work with the book; the pace of the online class would be too fast for our taste.

 

I don't know how rigorous the Teaching company course is - the first 16 lectures of the algebra 2 course are actually algebra 1 material, so that makes me wonder.

Edited April 10, 2011 by regentrude

[In The Great White North]

I have their algebra I and calculus, and would not recommend them. Ds was bored, the speaker was too slow, etc, etc. I think they were designed for senior citizens trying to remember their algebra from 50 years ago.

 

In addition, they are hard to correlate to a standard text (We used Foerster)

 

I would recommend AoPS. (Sadly, ds was ahead of the AoPS publishing schedule.)

[Donna]

I have the Great Courses Algebra II and my son thought it was incredibly boring. He ended up using Thinkwell but I plan on using AoPS with my daughter once she is ready for Algebra. I didn't know about it when ds was ready for Algebra but have since read the book, checked out the website, and heard only good things about it.

[EKS]

I think they were designed for senior citizens trying to remember their algebra from 50 years ago.

 

 

 

This.

 

Though generally Teaching Company courses are pretty good.

[EKS]

It's less important that the course be rigorous than that it keep his interest.

 

The Thinkwell lectures definitely kept the interest of my elementary aged son. Unfortunately, the Thinkwell problem sets are pretty bad, so bad that over my son's protests we stopped using Thinkwell.