Struggling in Honors Algebra 2

[Anonymous]

Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

We bought a textbook off amazon.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Whitman Math teachers are now providing plenty of links for extra study / practice before tests. I think this is helpful and a direct result of the school being made aware of this situation.

So whoever has been talking directly with the school thank you on behalf of us whose kids have been struggling.

Churchill - not so much. They are plowing through the coursework like the pandemic closure never happened. There are no pre-assessments or checks for gaps in learning. No extra resources to help students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

I don't have an actual link - but Delta Math

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

I don't have an actual link - but Delta Math

Delta math sucked during online learning and it definitely sucks when students are back in the classroom.

The big problem with these online platforms is that the teachers cannot see the types of mistakes students are making.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

I don't have an actual link - but Delta Math

Delta math sucked during online learning and it definitely sucks when students are back in the classroom.

The big problem with these online platforms is that the teachers cannot see the types of mistakes students are making.

Depending on your child's needs, they may need a tutor to explain concepts and get feedback or they repetition/practice of problems. Does your child struggle understanding a math concept, forget how to do specific calculations, doesn't memorize formulas or make careless errors, etc.? If you can, ask to see your child's formative exams. Or watch them work through homework/Delta math problems.

I realized that my child understands quickly but needs to do more practice problems (daily or every other day) because he forgets how to do something (makes careless mistakes) or doesn't remember the formula. Therefore, I have my child do IXL math as reinforcement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

You can use the AoPS Alcumus tool (https://artofproblemsolving.com/alcumus), as it's completely free and has more than 10 thousand problems with complete solutions to each problem. A few pro tips:

- The problems are more challenging on average than normal questions one sees in school, even in honors/AP classes. But you get to see the full solution to each problem which can help students learn well.
- Due to the above, students should bump the difficulty setting to 'Easy' as a start, (even though the algorithm adapts and will feed tougher problems if they get questions correct, and it will back off if they get stuff wrong).
- An efficient way to practice problems for a test (let's say as an example, you know your school test will have quadratic equations as a topic), is to set the main topic to either 'Algebra' then pick a subtopic related to quadratics and try out some problems. Here's a screenshot showing a partial list of Algebra subtopics (note the multiple subtopics related to quadratics): https://ibb.co/RyPKftc
- There are many many problems in the database for each subtopic; typically between 50-100, and each major topic (i.e Algebra, Geometry, etc) contains around 50-60 subtopics. They will definitely not run out. Also, they should not expect to solve them all successfully because they can get significantly harder (each question in the database is assigned a difficulty level, from 1-25 and the difficulty level of the question is displayed). But seeing the full solution after each question can definitely help with learning and understanding.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

I don't have an actual link - but Delta Math

Delta math sucked during online learning and it definitely sucks when students are back in the classroom.

The big problem with these online platforms is that the teachers cannot see the types of mistakes students are making.

Agreed. My kids are struggling terribly with online math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where are people finding good practice problems? Can someone share a link?

You can use the AoPS Alcumus tool (https://artofproblemsolving.com/alcumus), as it's completely free and has more than 10 thousand problems with complete solutions to each problem. A few pro tips:

- The problems are more challenging on average than normal questions one sees in school, even in honors/AP classes. But you get to see the full solution to each problem which can help students learn well.
- Due to the above, students should bump the difficulty setting to 'Easy' as a start, (even though the algorithm adapts and will feed tougher problems if they get questions correct, and it will back off if they get stuff wrong).
- An efficient way to practice problems for a test (let's say as an example, you know your school test will have quadratic equations as a topic), is to set the main topic to either 'Algebra' then pick a subtopic related to quadratics and try out some problems. Here's a screenshot showing a partial list of Algebra subtopics (note the multiple subtopics related to quadratics): https://ibb.co/RyPKftc
- There are many many problems in the database for each subtopic; typically between 50-100, and each major topic (i.e Algebra, Geometry, etc) contains around 50-60 subtopics. They will definitely not run out. Also, they should not expect to solve them all successfully because they can get significantly harder (each question in the database is assigned a difficulty level, from 1-25 and the difficulty level of the question is displayed). But seeing the full solution after each question can definitely help with learning and understanding.

Thank you for this!

[Anonymous]

For my children that graduated before the pandemic, we never had to hire tutors for math and they progressed fine throughout high school. For my child who struggled during online learning, he did not have problems in math before online learning and he is still failing to make progress in math this year. The proof is his abysmal unit tests. He gets so many redos and free correction points that his report card grade is passing but at what cost? He is not able to demonstrate mastery of the material.

MCPS is passing students to get them out of high school. They don’t care that students are being passed without learning the material.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For my children that graduated before the pandemic, we never had to hire tutors for math and they progressed fine throughout high school. For my child who struggled during online learning, he did not have problems in math before online learning and he is still failing to make progress in math this year. The proof is his abysmal unit tests. He gets so many redos and free correction points that his report card grade is passing but at what cost? He is not able to demonstrate mastery of the material.

MCPS is passing students to get them out of high school. They don’t care that students are being passed without learning the material.

Can we please face the fact that for a large plurality of students, once they get past SAT/ACT, there is no need for them to have mastered the advanced math material.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For my children that graduated before the pandemic, we never had to hire tutors for math and they progressed fine throughout high school. For my child who struggled during online learning, he did not have problems in math before online learning and he is still failing to make progress in math this year. The proof is his abysmal unit tests. He gets so many redos and free correction points that his report card grade is passing but at what cost? He is not able to demonstrate mastery of the material.

MCPS is passing students to get them out of high school. They don’t care that students are being passed without learning the material.

Can we please face the fact that for a large plurality of students, once they get past SAT/ACT, there is no need for them to have mastered the advanced math material.

Unless they want to major in STEM. And be employed in sectors where a great deal of the $$ jobs will be in the near future.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For my children that graduated before the pandemic, we never had to hire tutors for math and they progressed fine throughout high school. For my child who struggled during online learning, he did not have problems in math before online learning and he is still failing to make progress in math this year. The proof is his abysmal unit tests. He gets so many redos and free correction points that his report card grade is passing but at what cost? He is not able to demonstrate mastery of the material.

MCPS is passing students to get them out of high school. They don’t care that students are being passed without learning the material.

Can we please face the fact that for a large plurality of students, once they get past SAT/ACT, there is no need for them to have mastered the advanced math material.

Unless they want to major in STEM. And be employed in sectors where a great deal of the $$ jobs will be in the near future.

Even non-STEM college majors require Calculus.

[Anonymous]

This is the math recovery plan announced by Dr. McKnight before the start of the school year:

https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/uploadedFiles/reopening/Mathematics%20-%202.5%20Year%20Mitigation%20of%20Learning%20Disruptions%20-%20Recovery%20Plan%20Overview.pdf

Our high school is not implementing anything close to the supports for students highlighted in this plan. Dr. McKnight and her Central Office staff get an E for follow through with the MCPS plan. At our school, the resources for tutors or specialized math support don’t exist that is in the plan. That’s a Central Office fiasco that is snowballing from their initial decision to reduce the curriculum for two academic years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is the math recovery plan announced by Dr. McKnight before the start of the school year:

https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/uploadedFiles/reopening/Mathematics%20-%202.5%20Year%20Mitigation%20of%20Learning%20Disruptions%20-%20Recovery%20Plan%20Overview.pdf

Our high school is not implementing anything close to the supports for students highlighted in this plan. Dr. McKnight and her Central Office staff get an E for follow through with the MCPS plan. At our school, the resources for tutors or specialized math support don’t exist that is in the plan. That’s a Central Office fiasco that is snowballing from their initial decision to reduce the curriculum for two academic years.

It's called paying lip service. When someone asks what the plan is they can point to this and hope the person asking goes away Nothing is being implemented. AT least not at HS level.