Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments AOPS during the school day

Hi All --

DS7 will finish the elementary school math curriculum next year, and after that we are considering enrolling him in the Art of Problem Solving Pre-algebra class.

Experienced AOPS hands: how well does it mesh with the school day? Do your kids work entirely independently on the AOPS problem sets in school? Is there any oversight? What if they need help or get stuck? After AOPS is there any going back to regular math classes?

I'd be interested to hear everyone's experiences!
-ULH

My eldest is doing an Algebra 2 class with AoPS.

There are things I really like about AoPS, but based on my experience with just this class, I'm not sure that it can replace a traditional course in the subject it covers. From what I've observed, AoPS is really good for giving challenging problems once you understand the basic ideas. But my son doesn't really get a lot of the basics from his class. We use a classic textbook authored by a guy named Richard Brown for the basics.* So I wouldn't really talk about AoPS in terms of not being able to go back to a regular math class. Well, the kind of math class I run, anyway. DS had to sit through a regular math class for six weeks last year and he was tearing his hair out over it.

Have you thought about EPGY or CTY?

*ETA: The Brown books (he wrote four, from Algebra 1 to Advanced Math) also provide a lot of challenging problems. IMO, they're some of the best high school math textbooks out there.

Also, will your son's teacher let him study math independently? Getting my son there took a lot of effort.

Have you talked to your school district about options for pre-algebra yet? I would start there for two reasons - one, you want to have your ds study a course that the district will recognize as an actual course rather than enrichment (so he can move on rather than having to take pre-algebra over again, also so he can prove mastery) and second, because I'm guessing there's a chance your district might have an option in place already that he could use for pre-algebra. Granted, it's only a guess, but for instance, our district has it's own online pre-algebra course - used primarily by 6th graders taking pre-algebra that isn't offered at their elementary school.

I would suspect that your district's gifted department would be familiar with either EPGY or CTY and would consider granting credit for courses through one or both.

polarbear

My DS10 is in 5th and does AoPS pre-algebra at school. He does the Friday afternoon online class and does his homework during the week when the other kids are getting their math lessons. It works pretty well. His teacher will answer questions if he has any.

The biggest problem is that the teacher wants some kind of empirical evidence that my son is doing math-- and since the problems are all online, it's impossible to document. (Yes, the teacher sees him working on the problems, but there's no evidence for his records.) As a result, the teacher has started having my son take the tests the other kids are doing (6th grade EM). On the one hand, I find that annoying. But on the other, my son says the tests are really easy and he doesn't mind doing it, so I haven't intervened.

We are fortunate that we didn't have to advocate too strongly to get a different math curriculum for our son. The middle school math options are too far away for us, so everyone agreed this was a good choice for him. I think it's extremely challenging and will prepare him well for algebra. In our district, kids take a placement test and are put into the appropriate classes in middle school.

My advice would be to talk to a district gifted coordinator-- or to the gifted coordinator at your son's middle school-- to see how they would handle his math placement in coming years.

The tentative plan was to send DS7 to the middle school for math once he reaches the 4th grade. I am not sure about the rigor of the math program or how disruptive this would be to his schedule. That is why we are considering AOPS as an alternative.