Math Olympiad Contest Problems for Elementary and Middle Schools

I borrowed this library book for my DS9. I think our school does Math Olympiad competition in later grades. I did not see any reference to age or grades with the different problems. My son scored 145 on Math broad score on Woodcock Johnson. He is in 3rd grade doing 3 & 4th grade math this year and it seems too easy. He is having some check your work issues/follow all directions issues. He almost never gets anything wrong in school this year unless he has a not being careful issue. He is straight As so far. Is this a good book for a child to use on their own? Any suggestions for using this?

anybody use Math olympiad?

I don't know anything about Math Olypiad, but I'm sure someone does. There's less posting here on the weekends. Give it a day or so...

thank you

The MOEMS contents has 4th-6th grade divisions and a 7-8th grade division. The book you have may only have the elementary problems; I forget.

I've just started doing Math Olympiad problems (from the 2nd volume of the book) with my DS9 and other "highly capable" 3rd graders at his school. This is a 1 hour a week pullout, and we've only met once, so I don't have a lot of experience with it yet but the level of the problems strikes me as appropriately challenging for my group so far.

My experience with the problems is that many of them allow a slow brute-force (or calculator) solution, but also have an elegant and quick solution. They're intended to teach problem solving techniques (and the mathematics behind those techniques). Reading or discussing the solutions is pretty essential to getting the most out of them, I think. Once your son gets the hang of the book, I'd guess he'd love working on it on his own. But you might want to work a few sets of problems with him the first time, to make sure he's using the resource well.

If he doesn't think it is challenging enough, you might try doing the problems in the time limits suggested for the questions.

If these really are too easy, try the middle-school level. (Volume 2 of the book you have has the middle school problems, I know.) And if those are too easy, try artofproblemsolving.com I'm looking forward to getting this book when my DS is ready:

http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Books/AoPS_B_Item.php?item_id=100

re:Math Olympiad Contest Problems for Elementary and Middle Schools (see 1st post)

Does anyone know if you can just skip around in the book? Or should a student work in the order of the book? Any other pointers or comments are appreciated.

Thank you in advance

It should be fine to skip around. Each "olympiad" includes 5 problems of varying difficulty, but each of the olympiads stand alone and are at the same level. You can pick at random, if you feel like it.

If I recall correctly (and I have volume 2, not the one you're looking at) there is an index of problems by problem topic, so you can even pick and choose problems in a particular area of interest, or reinforce the solution to one problem with another problem that uses the same math skills...

thank you. I'm not a mathie person but I'm going to give it a try with my DS.

Here's another resource. If the MOEMS problems become too easy (or if you just need to return the book to the library :-) try the AMC8 tests. 25 multiple choice questions that start pretty easy and get progressively harder. I forget what the time limit is. It might be 40 minutes. The 8 in AMC8 indicates that these questions are for 8th grade and under.

Lots of tests and solutions here: http://mathjunk.googlepages.com/amc8

I've been wondering about this myself. I just received the MOEMS book from Amazon and look forward to using it to supplement my son's math curriculum. I was hoping to see some sort of appendix listing all the topics (e.g., Dividing Fractions: see problems 1, 4, 12). A topical list would make it so much easier to use this book as a curriculum supplement! Since the book doesn't provide such an appendix, does anyone know of such a list out there in cyber world?

Also, I know MOEMS has two divisions-- Div E for upper elementary and Div M for junior high. Do both divisions take the same tests?

I found the topical list! It is very short and squeezed in between the appendices and glassary, so it just took me a while to find it.

I'm still trying to figure out the Div E and Div M thing.

Division E is easier.

Division E is grades 4-6 (probably E for "elementary"?)
Division M is grades 6-8 (maybe M for "middle"?)

There are specific rules regarding the composition of each team.

www.moems.org/contests.htm