She is in fifth grade. I think I'd better PM you some of the details. It's a little too drawn out for the forum!
The homework consists of 1-reading the chapter and doing the problems discussed in the text, 2-doing the Alcumus database of questions on topics assigned for each week, 3-completing a set of challenge problems and sending them into AOPS once every four weeks or so, and 4-doing the problems at the end of each chapter. My daughter pretty much does 1,2,3 and has not been doing much of 4. It is hard to estimate how much time it takes, as she will work for 10-30 min, 2-3 times a day.
What else? Oh, well. It's hard. Some of those questions are pretty challenging. I read somewhere that AOPS gives you the nuts and bolts of the subject... and then asks you to build the Taj Mahal.
She doesn't get them all right. Sometimes on a level 25 question, she will flat out give up. Sometimes Alcumus will give your child a question on material she's never seen before... kind of throws a wrench into things.
You might want to read this note from the website:
http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Resources/articles.php?page=discretemathI wish I had before we started Algebra. I might have chosen a different course (probability or number theory). I am not trying to rush through high school math; we were just trying to find something to challenge her in her favorite subject.
