This year DD9 has been doing a mix of Dreambox, Life of Fred, and doing Abeka 5th grade speed drills, quizzes and tests (just to have a measuring rod on the basics). Last year, when she was in 3rd grade, I did Abeka 5th grade without the testing and skipped a lot of the repetition. She hated math. This year Dreambox has been her main day-to-day math. She loves it. She is a very audiovisual child, though I try to limit screen time and is very active otherwise. She did not like other video math curriculum either because they were boring. The problem is that it looks like she will have gone all the way through dreambox by the end of this school year or very close to it and through the first 13 life of Fred books (through Mindshaft). The question is, where do I go from there? I am afraid a standard curriculum will be boring to her and she will hate math again. I also need something that she can do mostly on her own.
I was going to say that. AOPS PA is sixth grade gifted kids but a lot go from something like Singapore maths 5. If you go to their website and sign up for a free alcamus account she can get an idea. There are also a lot of videos free on the site. If she likes it you can just use their text or do online classes. Once you get past the PRe Algebra though the courses are very fast paced and heavy workload (whole year compressed into 4 months). Jousting Armadillos is also popular as an in between step.
Beast Academy is only out from 3a to 4(d I think) but it is generally considered more challenging than other programmes.
My older daughter actually does AoPS Algebra and brushed through the pre-Algebra. I don't think my dd9 will like it. Beast Academy seems it would be a repeat. Something like it but more advanced is what I am hoping to find
I haven't heard of Jousting Armadillos. I will have to look into that.
I am thinking of continuing with Life of Fred, but just the books doesn't seem like enough practice. She gets concepts very easily but she does need practice.
If you go to this Holt textbook link http://go.hrw.com/gopages/ma/msm3_07.html and click on homework help, you can see the same videos that appear to be in that Thinkwell site (and it's free), as well as practice problems.
These are the videos that DD is supposed to watch for school, but I think they are fairly idiotic. You can take a look, though.
Another vote for AoPS and Beast Academy. Anything will be better than A Beka (they're against set theory, right?)
Why does she need to be able to do it mainly on her own? I think it's reasonable for many nine year olds to need help to work through new concepts, and I think that homeschooling offers a wonderful opportuniy to do that with her in a way she'd never get in a class. A really good live tutorial to introduce each new concept or just enthuse together over cool stuff (the infinite hotel!) together is very useful, especially if she's not enjoying it any more.
There are so many cool, fun, interesting math videos once you're past basic operations!
Yes, that's my problem. I know about a lot of curricula, but she so much fell in love with learning through games on Dreambox that I think now everything else will be boring again. I will look at some of your suggestions.
I wonder if anyone has tried the Standard Deviants DVDs.
Videos are fine if they are not just simply somebody walking through a problem, but are actually entertaining. It's easy to find that for younger grades but not pre-Algebra. I may just stick with Life of Fred and add practice problems and some game time. Some of this stems from being a very young-minded active 9yr old who is not really into school but also ready for pre-algebra.
Tallulah, I don't know about the set theory part but I can't stand Abeka math. I just had access to the books and used them but in my own way last year and use the tests this year. My work schedule has changed so that I can't directly work with her everyday like I did before.
Another one is MEP. It is free to down load and some levels can be done on line. It is English based on (Hungarian?) So integrated but challenging and conceptual. There are lesson plans for a ckadd teacher and a workbook (the levels I have looked at only have one page per day.
During the school year, yy DS8 does Singapore math at school, and Dreambox at home. His teacher likes the TenMarks program- DS thinks it's boring, but I like the straightforward math. It's a good "check" for understanding.
When I want to introduce new ideas, I use "Horrible Maths" and a book called "Help your kids with math" by DK. It's actually quite a good book for introducing beginner algebra, geometry, etc. or topics that tend to interest gifted math students (golden ration, etc.)
We tried Beast Academy and may work with it a bit this summer. I think DS needs to develop more patience for it because the problems are more analytical and time consuming. He is likely moderately ADHD, and loses his cool easily.
All that said, I think Singapore math is a solid elementary school curriculum with the potential for high level thinking via challenging word problems.
Because DS goes to private school, I am introducing algebra gradually into his thinking, rather than looking for a formal algebra curriculum. It shocks me that in a couple of years, DS may be ready for "real" algebra.
I would just like to say, there is a lot to math. There are many types of thinkers who turn into math lovers. Some highly logical people love math, some very visual spatial people love math. Some people need to learn math bottom up as it is taught in most schools, some are able and prefer to learn top down where a tough real world problem is expressed then said individual must learn all of the math to solve the tough problem. Often, I've seen on this forum "Foster the love of reading", good advice, I say the same holds true of math. I do love math. If an individual loves math they will become very good at it.
I believe the way to learn to love math is to see it in a light where some area of its natural beauty according to ones own strengths is illuminated. This requires some searching. For me math is very visual. When describing math concepts I use visual words. I try to explain the shape of the problem. I was this way as a very young child, and I hated time wasted on all of the building blocks that teachers felt were sooooo important, which were painfully obvious to me. So in grade school, I hated math class, but did love math.
So in practice if the child has any area of math that the child loves, I would say foster that love, and find problems that require the learning of the necessary building blocks. Doing fun projects that really require math to solve, to me those are awesome. They are best when not manufactured, but legitimately real. So often in grade school all of the problems are so obviously manufactured to teach a specific concept, where as in the real world math shows up in unexpected ways. The fun for me is solving that unexpected math.
True, all of the grade school checkboxes should get checked, but the love of math is far more precious than the checkboxes.
What good advice, it is 2 day. It's too bad I can't really find much time or possibility for it with my public schooled child. She is extremely interested in what I guess is number theory. She is fascinated by things like primes and finding huge primes. Anything with a pattern involving pure numbers is like catnip for her. Interestingly, she also loved percentages, for some reason I can't place. Otherwise, she is not much into school math on an everyday basis. I am hoping that the leap into more exciting concepts will turn on some lights for her. She will have to take a test to determine her middle school math placement soon and I certainly hope she does well, or she'll be wasting her time. But she has a tendency to learn things perfectly and forget them if they are not used.
What good advice, it is 2 day. It's too bad I can't really find much time or possibility for it with my public schooled child. She is extremely interested in what I guess is number theory. She is fascinated by things like primes and finding huge primes. Anything with a pattern involving pure numbers is like catnip for her. Interestingly, she also loved percentages, for some reason I can't place.
Apologies if I'm saying something you already know well! But one option that jumps to mind for recreational number theory is the AoPS videos, which are quite entertaining. While they do not yet, unfortunately, have videos for their Number Theory Course, they do for the Counting & Probability one, which looks like it would hit on at least a few of her favourite things (www.artofproblemsolving.com/Videos/index.php?type=counting). There's also number theory and related videos in the Pre-Algebra course (www.artofproblemsolving.com/Videos/index.php?type=prealgebra).
I hear you on the difficulties of after-schooling - we've found it very challenging to find time, and not always fun and rewarding the way we'd like. But if your DD is the self-motivated kind (about which I know nothing ), perhaps she might enjoy wandering through the AoPS book and Alcumus questions at her own pace?
We supplement rather than homeschool, but my younger one (8) wants games instead of the usual curriculum at school and complains a lot. I responded by adding recreational math about once a week outside school, and it seems to improve her attitude so she will do the regular curriculum. Vi Hart videos, Numberphile videos, stuff from Moebius Noodles, an item from an Ian Stewart book, a chapter from The Number Devil, etc. all work as stimulus for her. Because it's just to keep her attitude up, I don't worry too much about exactly what she learns from these. She still doesn't like the school math, as she calls it, but she sees why it's necessary for what she likes.
We usually end up doing fun math together instead of a bedtime story that night or in a spare 10 minute chunk of time, and she keeps thinking about it and playing with the ideas later without me.
Maybe this would work for you, too - pick whatever curriculum works for you in terms of content and pedagogy, and keep her motivation up with fun bits outside the curriculum?
No, you're not saying anything I know!--because her school workload is so heavy and she so values her free time (she is very creative) that I rarely dare to venture into afterschooling. Problems of any kind would certainly scare her off. But she likes to TALK about math that interests her, and watch some videos. So thanks! I wish we were mathier. I feel bad that she doesn't have mathy parents.
ETA: I think one of her potential middle schools does a big stock market simul...actually, yes, I could totally see her being into that.
My son also likes to talk about math. Maybe you can find a local math club for her to attend? We did and DS loves going to it.
I am decent at math but not at his level so we found a college professor that tutored him occasionally. DS was very excited after their lessons/discussions.
We're doing a combo of Derek Owens PreAlgebra at an accelerated (2x) pace and Critical Thinking Company's Discovering Geometry for dd9. We do/ have done Alcumus, Zaccaro, and Creative Problem Solving in School Mathematics. Dd does a lot of math on her own, so I'm really gap-filling. AoPS PreA would not be a good fit here, either. She loves Murderous Maths, though.
We came from Singapore 5, did a quick spin through Math Mammoth 6(about 4 months), and will probably move on to Jacobs Algebra when we finish Derek Owens. We could have skipped the Math Mammoth (or maybe went straight to the Jacobs), but I guess I don't feel like it was wasted time. It really has helped dd learn to "read to learn". I also wanted more time to work on math facts.
If you didn't want to full course for Derek Owens PreA, you can get away with just the workbooks (about $20 each for 2). The answers are in the back for the initial problem set. The tests, exams, and extra homework pages and answers for those three things are on the flash drive.
Another one for middle school up is elements of mathematics fundamentals.
I have been told in private the eIMACs really does not want 9 year olds. My dd had scored very high on the placement test, but I was waved off by a mom whose son had tried it before 10 and had a bad experience. I think it could be a really good fit for some kids, but Elements folks really want the maturity as well as the ability.
We went from SM 5 to Discovering Math/Dimensions Math with our first, and from 6 to same with the next child, each at about age 9. It's the middle school series from SM. Four courses of integrated pre-algebra, algebra, geometry, and beginning geometry. We've found it quite good, but not realistic for independent work. Parental support was definitely required at the younger ages, though after about 11 or 12, it started to become easier.
), perhaps she might enjoy wandering through the AoPS book and Alcumus questions at her own pace?