Pre-calculus options

[Chris in PA]

I am looking at pre-calculus options for my dd who will be a senior next year. She is a B math student. She really doesn't like math or science and is planning on majoring in English. She needs a 4th math unit for our local state university where she plans to attend.

We will need a course with a video option. I tried Lial's precalculus last year with her older sister and we made it through enough of the text to call it college algebra. I hit a wall and so did she with understanding the concepts and the DVT's that came with the text only "re-read" the lesson so it was no help. So this will not be an option for dd#2. She is currently working through Lial's Intermediate Algebra and that is going well for her. Here are the options I am considering:

 

1. Chalkdust (either pre-calc or college algebra)

2. BJU pre-calc with the DVD option

3. TT Pre-calc

4. Thinkwell videos

 

Does anyone have experience with these programs? I am looking for advice on the strengths and weaknesses of these. I have never used Chalkdust or the BJU with DVD option. I am not sure how they work. I assume the teacher actually "teaches" a lesson and doesn't re-read the text. Do they assign a problem set or do I need to do that? I would do the grading of the problem sets and tests. Is there a solutions manual to show how to work through the problems if she gets stuck? I have also read on these forums that Chalkdust is difficult. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

Thanks

Edited December 28, 2011 by Chris in PA

[speedmom4]

My daughter is using TT for Pre-Calc. She wants to major in piano performance so higher level math isn't that important to us. We wanted something that had good explanations and was manageable time wise. We have been very pleased with it so far. She also did TT for Geometry, we used Saxon previously.

 

She made a 670 on her math portion of the SAT so I have no complaints.

 

God Bless,

Elise in NC

[choirfarm]

I am looking at pre-calculus options for my dd who will be a senior next year. She is a B math student. She really doesn't like math or science and is planning on majoring in English. She needs a 4th math unit for our local state university where she plans to attend.

We will need a course with a video option. I tried Lial's precalculus last year with her older sister and we made it through enough of the text to call it college algebra. I hit a wall and so did she with understanding the concepts and the DVT's that came with the text only "re-read" the lesson so it was no help. So this will not be an option for dd#2. She is currently working through Lial's Intermediate Algebra and that is going well for her. Here are the options I am considering:

 

1. Chalkdust (either pre-calc or college algebra)

2. BJU pre-calc with the DVD option

3. TT Pre-calc

4. Thinkwell videos

 

Does anyone have experience with these programs? I am looking for advice on the strengths and weaknesses of these. I have never used Chalkdust or the BJU with DVD option. I am not sure how they work. I assume the teacher actually "teaches" a lesson and doesn't re-read the text. Do they assign a problem set or do I need to do that? I would do the grading of the problem sets and tests. Is there a solutions manual to show how to work through the problems if she gets stuck? I have also read on these forums that Chalkdust is difficult. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

Thanks

 

My junior boy is doing Chalkdust Pre-calculus right now. Yes, Dana Mosely lectures. For my mathy boy, it is enough. It wasn't enough for my middle one (Geometry). He grades his own work as I don't understand what he is doing AT ALL. I grade the tests and often ask him to explain something if he got a different kind of answer. He has done fine with everything except verifying identies. Other than that he has made an A. He has finished up chapter 6, so he is halfway through. He normally finishes his Chalkdust texts early, but this one is a little harder than the previous ones plus sometimes I have him do test prep work instead of Precalc. ( I'm sorry, but I'm not going to have him do ACT or SAT math sections AND his precalc work!) He generally watches a lesson and does the entire lesson (odd problems) in one day. I don't think most kids do that. Most kids would watch a lesson and do part of the problems. They would then take another day or two to finish.

 

To be honest, if you have a kid who is self-motivated and loves math like my oldest, then I recommend Chalkdust But not if you have just a "regular" kid, I wouldn't!!!

[Janice H]

wanted to add my experience with the Chalkdust program. The dvds are good for what they do. I have watched about one-half of the precalc set. Dana mostly demonstrates how to work out problems; there is not a lot of talking about theory or conceptual presentations on topics. Dana certainly does not read the text. A plus for his presentations are the occasional problems where all the graphing calculator steps are shown. (Because I don't need to know how to use a hand held grapher, I did all my graphs using free online graphers--bigger screen and colors.)

 

To me as a self-study student, the Larson textbook exposition is too broken up by things to do on the graphing calculator. For example, the text introduces a topic and the student is supposed to pick up the calculator, work a problem or input some data, and then discover patterns or gain some insight into the topic. This works better in a classroom with a teacher to guide and to confirm the answer. Even the TM presumes the teacher knows the answers to these questions posed within the text. If you are not sure you discovered what you were supposed to, you have to hope you sort it out as the chapter progresses.

 

Getting through the entire book could take longer than one year. There are many older posts about this. Many precalc books are big, heavy, and cover a lot of topics. With a text like Larson, your options include cutting out some topics (Google for syllabi for the book; you'll see how much gets taken out by some teachers), taking longer than one year to cover the course, or spending enough time each day on math to complete the entire book in one academic year.

[Musicmom]

My dd did Thinkwell Precalculus last year and liked it very much. Prof. Burger is very engaging, funny and explains concepts well. Each lecture is relatively short and followed by a set of online exercises. There is also a test for each chapter. Dd responded well to this format. She's a people person, so seeing the professor talking while at the same time seeing what he was writing--as well as his style and fast pace--suited her well, and it helped her like math more.

 

Things to be aware of: it's a fairly big course with A LOT of lectures--some from the Algebra 2 course. So you just need to plan carefully from the beginning of the year so you can cover it all.

 

The exercises (and tests) are online and multiple choice, so you need to make sure the student is writing out all steps carefully and neatly--this won't be checked, so it could be easy to get away with not doing it. The solution to each problem is shown in detail after an answer (right or wrong) has been chosen, so you can check to make sure you're doing it correctly, or see how to solve it if it has you stumped. For the tests, the solutions are not shown until after the whole test has been scored. For the tests, instead of working online, I had dd print out the whole test, work it on paper, and then enter her answers afterward. That way I had a paper record of her work, and could give partial credit where appropriate.

 

Another downside of the multiple choice is the ability at times to pick the right answer without having to do the work necessary to get that answer. One area where I noticed this was in graphing--where it was possible to pick the right graph (they're all there in front of you), without having to actually do the graphing. Also the exercises, especially at first, sometimes seemed very repetitious. This concerned me quite a bit in the early part of the course. One thing I tried to do for some variety in problems and to get away from the multiple choice format a bit, was to have dd do some problems out of the Lial Precalculus text that we had on hand. This worked quite well--and was good assurance that Thinkwell was indeed covering the material. Dd was usually able to do the Lial's problems without trouble. So by the end of the course, I didn't have as much concern over the exercises as I had at the beginning.

 

It would also be a good idea to either watch the lectures yourself along with the student, or have a tutor that you could turn to for questions. Dd bogged down in some of the later/more difficult material, so I had to step in and learn it myself in order to help. It was slow going, and I wished I had followed along from the beginning.

 

All this said, I thought Thinkwell was a good course and would use it again. I considered Chalkdust but didn't think it would be a good fit for my dd--we watched a sample lecture by Moseley somewhere online and she found it long and boring. Also, I had heard Chalkdust Precalculus could take 2 years and I didn't want something that long. I don't know enough about either BJU or TT to comment--other than I've heard TT can be very good for the less mathy. I think it's really a matter of finding the format that clicks best for your dc.

[3andme]

Have you also considered Derek Owens Precalculus class? He has videos as well as instructional and testing support. His classes seem to be getting good reviews although I don't have personal experience with them.

[EKS]

Have you also considered Derek Owens Precalculus class? He has videos as well as instructional and testing support. His classes seem to be getting good reviews although I don't have personal experience with them.

 

We love Derek Owens here! My older son took his precalculus course and we were pleased with it.

[Julie in MN]

We love Derek Owens here! My older son took his precalculus course and we were pleased with it.

 

Kai,

Did you like the Prentice Hall textbook he uses?

 

I like Mr. Owens, too, but it's pricey to pay $58 x 9 months, plus the textbook (and other materials?). When we tried him for geometry, he did allow us to just use his materials and correct things myself for a lower price. Not sure if I'd spend almost as much as I saved, though, on all of the textbook teaching materials for Prentice Hall, in order to correct it myself?

 

Julie

[Julie Smith]

Perhaps check out Art of problem solving (AOPS).

 

They have videos to watch online related to the textbook. The book itself is wordy which could appeal to someone wanting to be a English major.

[EKS]

Kai,

Did you like the Prentice Hall textbook he uses?

 

I like Mr. Owens, too, but it's pricey to pay $58 x 9 months, plus the textbook (and other materials?). When we tried him for geometry, he did allow us to just use his materials and correct things myself for a lower price. Not sure if I'd spend almost as much as I saved, though, on all of the textbook teaching materials for Prentice Hall, in order to correct it myself?

 

Julie

 

I have to admit that my son hardly used the book. All of the instruction is on the videos and preserved in the notes. There are practice problems assigned from the book which my son only did if he was stuck. The actual homework assignments are in the form of pdfs from Mr Owens (he corrects those).

 

If my son had used the textbook more it might have been nice to have a solutions manual, but I looked everywhere and couldn't find one for sale. The text is *really* old and I got ours for $10. Mr Owens seems to be moving away from the textbooks (the prealgebra course that my younger son is using doesn't have one and I love the format) though I would be surprised if he did so for the geometry course.