bethben Posted January 22, 2013 Share Posted January 22, 2013 My son is currently cruising through Saxon Algebra. He is doing Alcumus on the side. Alcumus is not difficult for him and he is completing levels in geometry, algebra, number theory, ect. Every once in a while he gets a problem with topics that he has not learned yet. The computation problems are easy for him (if he's learned it) and the word problems aren't really tripping him up. My question is this -I'm a little hesitant about putting a 7th grader into algebra 2. I know that good Algebra skills are important for later math skills, So, do I just continue with Algebra 2 or have a review time of Algebra with AOPS? I'm not too interested in continuing with AOPS simply because if I need a video teacher, they don't have that option past Algebra. Beth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
regentrude Posted January 22, 2013 Share Posted January 22, 2013 I replied in the other forum, but I'll copy my reply over here as well: I think reviewing algebra with AoPS is an excellent idea. The intro to Algebra book covers algebra 1 in chapters 1 through 13, but includes more material, goes into more depth conceptually, and contains more challenging problems. the discovery aspect of the program won't work for a student who has studied the material already, but it will still be a valuable experience. You are correct that algebra 1 is THE most foundational math course your student will take, so spending extra time with a challenging program is not a bad idea. AoPS does have online classes available - not just for algebra, but for higher math courses as well! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Candid Posted January 23, 2013 Share Posted January 23, 2013 You have a young son who is doing very well in math, can I suggest that eliminating AoPS because you are afraid you might need a crutch might be the wrong way to go? Instead consider the price difference for a video course as money you can use to get a local or internet tutor if need be and go forward. My experience is doing Singapore's NEM series and then switching to AoPS Pre-calc. Due to a heavy other load in my life, somewhere around book 3 in NEM I zoned out enough that even though I was pretty good in math in high school I could no longer keep up. At that point, I told my oldest, you are on your own, I'll grade, if you run into problems, let me know and I'll find you help. We've never looked back and times when he didn't have a clue have been almost nonexistent. He gets almost all his problems right with a few careless errors and on tests he he gets them all right first time. He hit a first practice set in the last month that he couldn't do without looking over their discussion, but did fine on the exercise following that. I'll stay alert, but I have confidence it will work out. And here's the thing, based on your description of where your son is for his age, your son is ahead of mine, so I suspect he, too will probably be fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bethben Posted January 23, 2013 Author Share Posted January 23, 2013 My concern is also that ds needs more of a spiral with lots of review built in. He did well with Singapore until he got to fractions. He got fractions, but then "forgot" and had to review in order to do problems with fractions later on in the curriculum. I just want the best of both worlds... beth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
regentrude Posted January 23, 2013 Share Posted January 23, 2013 But in algebra, there is a constant review built in, because all previous concepts are used in the next concept. Aside from the occasional obscure fact, it is impossible to forget how to do algebra because each chapter uses the concepts from each previous one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luckymama Posted January 23, 2013 Share Posted January 23, 2013 ^^^ That exactly. Dd is a seventh grader using AoPS Algebra 2. She did a schooly PreAlgebra in fifth grade. I knew I wanted her to use AoPS going forward, so last year she "repeated" PreAlgebra using AoPS. I am so glad she did as the problems were much more challenging (no plug and chug!) and engaging and the topics went into much greater depth. Dd also grew accustomed to the AoPS "style." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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