AoPS-How do you teach it?

[BusyMom5]

We just got our copy of AoPS in the mail, and I've skimmed it. I'm wondering how others teach this?  Do you just have your student read it and try the problems?  You read it aloud, explaining as needed, then let the student do the problems?  How do you space it out?  What if your child has issues figuring it out?   We have limited internet, and cannot just watch all the videos.  I can have her watch one at the library once a week or so.  Do you have them watch the video first?

[regentrude]

How old is your student? I started using AoPS Intro to Algebra with my DS in 6th grade and DD in 7th.

The books are written to the student. So, I had them read the problem and try to figure it out. When they were younger, I would be nearby, giving the occasional pointer when they got stuck. It is important to attempt the problems before looking at the solutions/explanations.

After working the problems, they then read over the solutions to the problems and worked the exercises. We worked the hardest problems together.

We never used any of the videos.

 

Unless a student has a reading disability, I don't see why I would read them aloud what they can just read themselves.

My role was to answer questions, give hints, discuss alternate solutions.

 

ETA: I found that AoPS does not lend itself well to being scheduled, since the problems and sections vary greatly in difficulty. My kids spend a certain amount of time on math daily and get as far as they get.

[Alice]

We just started using the Prealgebra this year with my 6th grader. He reads it himself. Typically he does one section a day. He works the problems as he goes and reads the solutions after. He then does the exercises at the end of each section (either on the next day or the same day depending on how long it's taking and the difficulty of the material). I check the exercises. If he misses a few I'll give it to him and have him try and correct it on his own, it's often careless mistakes. If he can't figure out what he did wrong we go over it together. If he misses a lot (for example, today) we go through it together and I try and figure out if he's missed something conceptually in that section. We do not use the videos. 

 

We tend to do the challenging problems together, sometimes side-by-side and scattered throughout. 

 

We are loving AoPS. It's a great fit for ds. He's a kid who loves math and likes the independent approach. 

 

[Space station]

Yep. Independent work here too, not taught. It does help for me to read ahead of my daughter so that I can answer any questions she may have quickly.

[TracyP]

My dd is in Pre-Algebra and we work side by side. When we work the problems, we cover the solutions and solve the problem on a whiteboard. If our answer is correct, we skim the solution to compare. If our answer is wrong, we read more closely to figure out where we went wrong. (I say we because we are working together, but in reality she is doing all the work. I guide as needed.) Then we each do the exercises in our own notebooks, stopping to check our answer after each one. We are in chapter 5 and have not used the videos yet.

 

This is a great method for us because I wanted to go through AoPS to brush up on my math skills, and dd enjoys working with me. She says she learns more when she can talk about what she is learning. It is a bit time-consuming but well worth it for me. I haven't tried to schedule it; we just work for 35-40 minutes each day. That usually works out to completing the problems one day and exercises the next, but it varies too widely to *plan* for that.

 

 

[EndOfOrdinary]

Working them on a whiteboard has done wonders here. Ds now does it completely independently, but when he started he was not totally there yet. Initially, I sat down with him, read the problem set out loud, and did the problems with him pointing out basically what the following pages were going to say. Lots of "what do you think?" And "Well, let's try it." He was/is risk adverse, so me being there greatly helped. Once he was really getting it, he would do the exercises independently. If you child has no previous exposure to reading a textbook as a stand alone resource, then I think a bit of an ease in might help sort out the dense material. AoPS was the first real textbook my son ever used so he had no idea how to wade through it regardless of being written approachablly.

 

We slowly weaned him off of this in the first three chapters. Now I am merely in the room if he has a glitch, or if he repeatedly is being stubborn and obviously not thinking at all (puberty is definitely coming).

 

He watches all the videos for each section in one sitting. Sometimes before, sometimes after. I have not found much of a difference in his approach or learning either way. The videos are a very quick run through. They do not do much as stand alone since they barely scratch the surface of the topic. They are just a nice reinforcement from a second adult that is not Mom.

[kiwik]

The videos are really good.

[SilverMoon]

DS/6th started prealg a couple months into the school year, and we're still in that mom dependent stage EndOfOrdinary described.

 

We go through the reading and problems together, discuss the solutions as we work through them, watch the videos if he thinks of them (he *loves* the nerdy humor of the author), and then I have him do the exercises as independently as he will tolerate. Some times we do the problems how they taught them, and some times we used a different method. We discuss it as we work through the solutions.

 

So far we've done one lesson a day on average, but because he's so resistant to using it away from my elbow we don't get to it every day. We did do the review problems one day and the challenge problems the next before going to the next chapter.

[maize]

We're doing prealgebra here as well. My DD does the reading herself, but for now I sit with her as she works the problems and we discuss things if she gets stuck; I do try to give her plenty of opportunity to wrestle with the problems herself though before making any suggestions/asking leading questions. After working the initial problems she reads through the solutions and we start on the end of section problem set, but often don't get through all of those in one day. I keep the solutions manual handy to double check answers, though at this point I'm mostly working the problems alongside her. I quite enjoy the AOPS approach.

 

Prior to jumping into AOPS DD was using MM and had been mostly independent in math for some time. For now though it seems to work best for me to stay close by with AOPS.

[Julie of KY]

I step through the example problems of each section with my child. I then assign the next set of problems. Any problems they have difficulty with, we do together. I skip the challenging problems if they are too challenging (one child).

[Woodland Mist Academy]

We have approached AoPS different ways at different times. After noticing some serious red flags with my daughter working on her own, we've decided to have her do all the problems on the whiteboard. My dd and I were clashing too much with AoPS, so I've turned it over to dh.  I am still working through the books on my own.

 

Following the concept of knowing you know something if you can teach it well, my daughter "teaches" the concept to my dh. He doesn't even look at the book, so she needs to explain everything she is doing so he understands what the problem is. This is teaching my daughter many things beyond math. My dh had much more math than I did, and he seems to be able to speak her math language better than I do. He can stop her before she spends an hour or two going down the wrong path, as well as add insights beyond what she was getting from just doing the book independently. It's also interesting to see if he approaches the problem differently than the book does. If we all happen to be in the study working on it together, it's fun to see how many different ways we've approached the problem. (Keeping it real... other times it resembles more of a heated argument than an insightful evening of mathematical chatter... :tongue_smilie: )

[boscopup]

In the beginning, I walked my son through it because he was 9. We did a lot of discussion and reading together.

 

By the third chapter, he was working independently. He reads the intro if there is one, works the problems, checks his work. If he struggles with anything, we go over it together. He does Problems one day and Exercises the next. If the Problems are quick and easy, he might do the Exercises that day also. That's pretty rare though. I aim for about 45 minutes of work (he's 10 now). Reviews and Challenge problems are usually done over 2-3 days each, again working about 45 minutes at a time.

 

We don't use the videos. Just the book.

[Roadrunner]

In the beginning, I walked my son through it because he was 9. We did a lot of discussion and reading together.

 

By the third chapter, he was working independently. He reads the intro if there is one, works the problems, checks his work. If he struggles with anything, we go over it together. He does Problems one day and Exercises the next. If the Problems are quick and easy, he might do the Exercises that day also. That's pretty rare though. I aim for about 45 minutes of work (he's 10 now). Reviews and Challenge problems are usually done over 2-3 days each, again working about 45 minutes at a time.

 

We don't use the videos. Just the book.

We do about the same thing. My kid works all the problems in the beginning of the chapter. I make sure he got them right. I make him read over solutions afterwards (he really doesn't want to usually because so far he has gotten everything right, but I am thinking this will change drastically as material gets harder) and summary exercises. There have been some sections in chapters 2 and 3 when we separated a section in two, but overall we are trying to avoid it. We usually spend two days on summary exercises and 2-3 days on challenges. We do work longer though, probably at least an hour on the book + 30 minutes on Alcumus. 

[daijobu]

Do you just have your student read it and try the problems?  You read it aloud, explaining as needed, then let the student do the problems?  How do you space it out?  What if your child has issues figuring it out?   We have limited internet, and cannot just watch all the videos.  I can have her watch one at the library once a week or so.  Do you have them watch the video first?

 

While I understand that the book is written directly to the student, I don't feel like my kids are ready for that level of self-study, and I certainly didn't have that level of independence when I was in high school, let alone middle school.

 

So, we read through the problems together, and try to solve them socratically.  Sometimes we can, sometimes we can't.  Then we read through the solutions together, whether we get them right or not, just to make sure we didn't miss any important points.

 

Then my dd's work through the exercises independently.  We check their work and review the problems they got wrong.  

 

They do  1 section per day.  Then I allow 1-2 days for review problems and 1-2 days for challenge problems at the end of each chapter.  Sometimes it takes them longer, especially for dd13 who is in geometry.  

 

The videos are nice, but they are time-consuming and didn't add all that much to the info in the text, so I wouldn't sweat missing them.  When the novelty wore off we stopped watching them.  

[BusyMom5]

Well, we started.  DD thinks it's lots of fun, like a puzzle.  I agree, but it took me a bit to figure out what exactly the book wanted us to do.  I knew the answer, but not sure exactly what I was supposed to be teaching.  THe first little part is proofs, so I made her do them forward and backward.  She's enjoying it!  Me, I feel like I need to spend a few hours with that book each weekend to know what to expect the next week!  I hope we are doing it right!  Thank you all for the help, my plan is to just do 45 minutes per day.  She is just in 6th grade, so if it takes us a while that's okay!