sbgrace Posted January 11, 2020 Share Posted January 11, 2020 (edited) My son is in Alg 2 (10th). I'm thinking ahead. I do not know where he's headed in terms of career directions, but business seems a strong possibility. He'll need statistics and calculus in college likely, or at least I did for my business major in college a lot of years ago. I did not take calculus (or precalc) in college, but did well in my college courses. I think my foundation was probably strong. I suspect more college students come in with calculus now, so maybe college courses are more advanced. I'd like him to have statistics--I think he might enjoy it, I think he may need it in college, and I think it's generally important. I am leaning toward thinking pre-calculus and statistics 1 sem/1 semester of something else (?) as his final 2 high school math courses after Alg 2. Would lack of calculus be a detriment on a college bound transcript or poor prep for college level work, assuming his algebra and pre-calculus are solid? If I wanted to get statistics in for him, how would his math sequence go statistics (and maybe another semester course) before or after pre-calculus? Edited January 11, 2020 by sbgrace Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BusyMom5 Posted January 11, 2020 Share Posted January 11, 2020 Is he planning any DE courses? They are just 1 semester long, so he could do college Algebra and Calc in 1 year. Stats the next semester. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sbgrace Posted January 11, 2020 Author Share Posted January 11, 2020 (edited) Possibly DE. I know he's definitely interested in taking some community college courses at some point, but I wasn't thinking math for those. A lot of our community college courses are moving to 8 weeks. That seems too quick for a math course to me. So stats would be after whatever I chose to follow Alg 2? I was thinking it might actually be more basic than Pre-Calc. I was thinking maybe the pre-calc right before college would be beneficial as it would be fresher in his mind. Edited January 11, 2020 by sbgrace Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frances Posted January 11, 2020 Share Posted January 11, 2020 2 hours ago, sbgrace said: Possibly DE. I know he's definitely interested in taking some community college courses at some point, but I wasn't thinking math for those. A lot of our community college courses are moving to 8 weeks. That seems too quick for a math course to me. So stats would be after whatever I chose to follow Alg 2? I was thinking it might actually be more basic than Pre-Calc. I was thinking maybe the pre-calc right before college would be beneficial as it would be fresher in his mind. Statistics could be taken right after Algebra II and is usually an easier course than pre-Calc. I think either order is fine though. If you only want to spend a semester rather than a year on statistics, you could do some basic, applied Calc for his last semester of high school just to give him an introductory look at what he will see in a college Calc class. The most important thing for success in college Calc will be strong algebra and pre-Calc skills. I think whether or not Calc needs to be on a homeschool high school transcript depends on the level of college he is looking at and his potential major. Not all high schools even offer calculus. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 11, 2020 Share Posted January 11, 2020 If you do DE Stat, be aware that there is calculus and non-calculus based statistics. Usually “Statistics for human sciences” will be algebra based, but the one taken my STEM folks calculus based. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J-rap Posted January 11, 2020 Share Posted January 11, 2020 I'm not a math person, so my opinion is purely anecdotal. Most of my kids ended math strongly with Algebra 2 and got into good colleges. However, these were mostly private LACs in our state. If your ds aims higher than that, you'd have to do more research. My ds took one semester of math beyond Algebra 2, which was Trigonometry. One of his majors in college was business management. I took statistics in college and thought it was an interesting and different type of math that worked my brain very differently. And it was hard for me, but I'm glad I took it. Interestingly, my only child who really struggled with math in high school ended up taking statistics in college and found it easy! So, personally, I think a semester of Pre-Calc or Trig + a semester of statistics would be fine, depending on the colleges he is interested in. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted January 11, 2020 Share Posted January 11, 2020 Because the content is so connected, I would go into pre-calc next and not put a semester or year of stats in between. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
madteaparty Posted January 11, 2020 Share Posted January 11, 2020 have you looked at what math the programs your DS may be interested in require. I know some suggest having calc. This is easily done with DE, not so easily done with year long classes. I like it when some decisions are made for us like that 😂 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
katilac Posted January 12, 2020 Share Posted January 12, 2020 (edited) Hmm, there are a couple of ways to think about this. Some business programs require calculus, some do not. Of those that do, some require standard calculus, and some require business calculus. All will require statistics. It's true that many students take calc in high school before they take it in college, but you can still do fine with a strong foundation. My oldest didn't have calc in high school, and she survived calculus 1-2-3 at a STEM school. I don't think algebra 2, stats, and precalc will look bad to the majority of schools. If you are thinking of highly competitive or specific schools, it's something you might check on, but in general I am fully on board with kids taking the classes that are most helpful now. I would only favor calculus if there is a STRONG chance he will go to a school where it is required or insanely helpful. For example, if he's had a school in mind for a long time, or if you research and discover a school that seems like a good fit and is also likely to give him merit aid or just otherwise be very affordable. fwiw, my dd did get admitted to schools without having some of their 'requirements' such as SAT subject tests. We knew there were schools she was interested in that required or recommended them, but she decided that she didn't want to change her high school plans based on that, bc there were other options if they didn't accept her other validation. I'll also say that her thoughts on what she wanted from a college changed so much that I was very glad we didn't gear her studies to specific requirements. I mean, she had a fairly standard schedule, we didn't go off the grid completely like some brave souls, but calculus and subject tests would have added an unpleasant layer of stress for this particular student. I would most likely do pre-calc next year and give time for senior year to become clearer. Depending on how tight his schedule is, maybe an easy statistics elective alongside, half a credit spread throughout the year? You could use Scammed by Statistics and other consumer-style books, maybe some videos, focus on case histories and examples, the why of studying statistics. It could be Intro to Statistics and then Statistics 1 senior year. Edited January 12, 2020 by katilac Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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