Jousting Armadillos—how long did it take your child and other questions

[Micron4]

My dd12 has done Right Start math from K-6th. The recommended next step is Videotext, but it looks so....dry.  Thinking about Jousting Armadillos for next year. Questions I have:

 

How long did it take your child to get through one book? A few months? The whole school year?

 

Was your child able to do this curriculum fairly independently? 

 

Did your child complete all three books in this series or did you move on to something else?

 

Which curriculum did you do next once this series was completed?

 

If you had to do it all over again, would you choose a different program for prealgebra?

 

Thanks in advance!

[Farrar]

It took us about half a school year or maybe a little more, but ds got really stuck near the end due to some anxiety issues. So that's not the program. At the Arbor School, they do it for the full year, but they clearly also use other materials for enrichment and other topics like geometry and so forth. It strikes me as a semester-long program.

Ds wasn't able to do it fairly independently because of the writing element. There was a lot of writing and at the time he needed more support for it.

We moved on to Jacobs's for algebra. He's almost finished now. It was a better fit for him. Much of the Arbor School books is drawn from Jacobs.

If I had it to do over, sadly, I wouldn't use JA again. I actually loved the program and some aspects of it were great for ds. Unfortunately, in the end, the writing about math element turned out to be to big an anxiety trigger for him. But that's not an indictment of the program at all. I think it's perfect for some kids. And it's excellently done. Other ds did Dolciani, which I thought was extremely thorough and solid. That wouldn't have been right for this kid either. Honestly, I wish there was another option out there for pre-algebra because nothing really suited this kid. Oh well. He's been very successful with Jacobs.

[SEGway]

It took about a semester here, also. The writing/verbal element of the instruction was a plus for us. We got bogged down in Crocodiles and Coconuts and have switched over to Singapore Dimensions 7A (after doing Singapore 1st-6th). We enjoyed the time with JA, but I'm not sure I'll use it again, either. My dd "feels" behind because we transitioned mid-stream. Like Farrar, I really liked several elements of the program. I'm just not sure when is a good time to plug it into the sequence of materials used at our house.

[Micron4]

Thank you so much for your responses. Really giving me something to think about. I wish Jacobs had a pre-algebra! (They don’t, right?)

[Plagefille]

We used the whole series. My DD loved it. She loved the notebooking element  and was very sad when she finished  the last book a couple months ago. 

Each book took most of the school year. We used the books 4 days a week and supplemented with various other books on the 5th day. 

I think it is best to use the whole series if you are going to do it. The only topics we needed to add were Pythagorean Theorem and circumference/area of a Circle.

We have been reviewing Algebra topics and will be starting Jacobs Geometry soon.

We really liked the curriculum. I liked that he explained multiple methods for solving problems. The books are reading heavy and can be done independently. My DD was independent by halfway through the first book.

[Micron4]

Thank you for your response, Plagefille. Is your DD more language arts oriented? Just wondering because my DD loves writing, so that's part of the reason I think this might be a good fit for her. I can imagine that for a more "engineering" type personality, the writing would be annoying. 

Also what other books did you supplement with on the 5th day?

[Farrar]

Jacobs doesn't have a pre-algebra, but he did write Mathematics: A Human Endeavor, which can be done at the pre-algebra stage and covers some pre-a topics. It's not comprehensive enough to be a pre-algebra though.

When JA stopped working, we did a little bit from Dolciani's Pre-Algebra, which his twin was using. Then we just dove into Jacobs's Algebra, but we did it alongside Mathematics: A Human Endeavor at first, alternating chapters. So he will have taken about a year and a half total because we did a lot of the first part slowly and added in the M:AHE stuff.

For a language arts centered kid, I think JA may be perfect. I wouldn't worry about it overmuch. See how it goes.

[Plagefille]

Yes, my DD is more language arts oriented. I decided not to use it with my son because he dislikes reading. I may or may not use it with my youngest. We will see when we get there.

I used mostly stuff off Pinterest and Teachers Pay Teachers to supplement. We also use Zaccaros books. Mostly the 5th day is for fun, review, mental math, and any topics I feel need to be done. We focus on weak areas and topics that were missed between Singapore 5 and JA.

I do also own Dolciani PreA and Jacob's Algebra which so far I have only used as a reference for topics. 

[SoCal_Bear]

Mine is accelerated in math so we used it to bridge between finishing SM5 and half way through BA5 (he decided he didn't want to finish BA). He did it in about 8 weeks. He says that he want to get to Algebra but I won't let him bypass Pre-Algebra. So JA was a quick pass through, and we are doing AOPS now. The step up in text and no illustrations without being as dense as AOPS worked for us. 

About 1/3 of Jacobs is a review of pre-algebra topics. https://www.askdrcallahan.com/hwhdocs/Algebra Tableof Contents.pdf

[Micron4]

Thanks everyone! I think we’re going to give JA a whirl. I appreciate you sharing your experiences.