Struggling in Hon Precalculus

[Anonymous]

OP here our textbook is Demana Precalculus 7th edition .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP back. He is in 9th. 8th grade MapM was 282. I am honestly in a new territory here because I have never had to worry about anything school related. We have always been very hands off with school with all of our kids. Older sibling took regular precalculus in 10th but in a different district. Never had any tutors for math or any of the AP courses. Older sibling is in an engineering program at UMD. This DS, middle child, also wants to be a physicist. He is worried that moving down to regular precalculus will be counted against him during college admissions. He wanted to take Calculus AB in 10th, BC in 11th and AP stats in 12th. He took Algebra 1 in 6th during COVID years but did AoPS Algebra 1 concurrently, so if he has gaps they have to be from Algebra 2. I will try to persuade him to take regular precalculus.

While it's great to have a plan, I wouldn't want one of my students to risk being unhappy and stressed in Honors PC on the belief that he wants to be physicist major 4 years from now. It's quite possible that his interests may change. (He hasn't even had high school physics yet.) On the other hand, if hard work and a tutor can help him persevere without ill effect, then Honors PC could work out fine.

I do question a year of AB followed by a year of BC. Except for a few objectives, BC is the same course as AB for 8 units before the 2 units that are exclusive to BC. In other words, he would get the entire AB course all over again while in BC. Not a tragedy, but a better path might be AB or BC, then multivariable, then AP Stat. A good thing to discuss with a counselor.

[Anonymous]

Op, it is a huge ramp up to precal. Our experience was there was little homework and little review in years prior and this is a true math class. We have parent help, child goes at lunch to teachers and will get a tutor as needed. The textbook helps a lot but they only a classroom or online copy so we bought the book and the answer key is online. In yeas past we used the free tutoring to fill in the gaps. Our plan is cal bc next year and not sure about the other two but probably will do statistics senior year as it’s good to take. Reach out to the teacher and see what they advise. It’s weird there is no standard in mcps in terms of curriculum but they textbook way for our child has been much better than the online without examples.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP back. He is in 9th. 8th grade MapM was 282. I am honestly in a new territory here because I have never had to worry about anything school related. We have always been very hands off with school with all of our kids. Older sibling took regular precalculus in 10th but in a different district. Never had any tutors for math or any of the AP courses. Older sibling is in an engineering program at UMD. This DS, middle child, also wants to be a physicist. He is worried that moving down to regular precalculus will be counted against him during college admissions. He wanted to take Calculus AB in 10th, BC in 11th and AP stats in 12th. He took Algebra 1 in 6th during COVID years but did AoPS Algebra 1 concurrently, so if he has gaps they have to be from Algebra 2. I will try to persuade him to take regular precalculus.

While it's great to have a plan, I wouldn't want one of my students to risk being unhappy and stressed in Honors PC on the belief that he wants to be physicist major 4 years from now. It's quite possible that his interests may change. (He hasn't even had high school physics yet.) On the other hand, if hard work and a tutor can help him persevere without ill effect, then Honors PC could work out fine.

I do question a year of AB followed by a year of BC. Except for a few objectives, BC is the same course as AB for 8 units before the 2 units that are exclusive to BC. In other words, he would get the entire AB course all over again while in BC. Not a tragedy, but a better path might be AB or BC, then multivariable, then AP Stat. A good thing to discuss with a counselor.

Skipping BC and jumping to multivariate is bad idea. It's a harder class, and the student is already falling of the track. Maybe take a semester to disciplined self study the BC topics. in between.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are at Wootton in Honors PreCalc as well. The teacher is very intimidating and explained at BTS night that this will be a hard class. She said real math starts now and everything prior to this did not count. I was scared leaving BTS night. We have a tutor now once a week via Zoom. Not sure if it will help as we just started. NHS and advisory period can be used for help as well. Or before school this particular teacher is there for visits.

Is your child complaining that assessments are very short like 20 minutes for 10 problems? This has been one of my son’s issues. That said I do not want to blame the teacher in any way, although I was scared too leaving BTS night.

I will. This teacher is putting his own ego above the students's learning, compensating for his own insecurity by lording over the students that he is better at math than they are.

My excellent AP teacher said that when he gives a test, he times himself doing it, and then gives the kids triple that time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are at Wootton in Honors PreCalc as well. The teacher is very intimidating and explained at BTS night that this will be a hard class. She said real math starts now and everything prior to this did not count. I was scared leaving BTS night. We have a tutor now once a week via Zoom. Not sure if it will help as we just started. NHS and advisory period can be used for help as well. Or before school this particular teacher is there for visits.

Is your child complaining that assessments are very short like 20 minutes for 10 problems? This has been one of my son’s issues. That said I do not want to blame the teacher in any way, although I was scared too leaving BTS night.

I will. This teacher is putting his own ego above the students's learning, compensating for his own insecurity by lording over the students that he is better at math than they are.

My excellent AP teacher said that when he gives a test, he times himself doing it, and then gives the kids triple that time.

You are making stuff up. Why would you jump to that conclusion? Perhaps the students in question are just ill-prepared.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP back. He is in 9th. 8th grade MapM was 282. I am honestly in a new territory here because I have never had to worry about anything school related. We have always been very hands off with school with all of our kids. Older sibling took regular precalculus in 10th but in a different district. Never had any tutors for math or any of the AP courses. Older sibling is in an engineering program at UMD. This DS, middle child, also wants to be a physicist. He is worried that moving down to regular precalculus will be counted against him during college admissions. He wanted to take Calculus AB in 10th, BC in 11th and AP stats in 12th. He took Algebra 1 in 6th during COVID years but did AoPS Algebra 1 concurrently, so if he has gaps they have to be from Algebra 2. I will try to persuade him to take regular precalculus.

While it's great to have a plan, I wouldn't want one of my students to risk being unhappy and stressed in Honors PC on the belief that he wants to be physicist major 4 years from now. It's quite possible that his interests may change. (He hasn't even had high school physics yet.) On the other hand, if hard work and a tutor can help him persevere without ill effect, then Honors PC could work out fine.

I do question a year of AB followed by a year of BC. Except for a few objectives, BC is the same course as AB for 8 units before the 2 units that are exclusive to BC. In other words, he would get the entire AB course all over again while in BC. Not a tragedy, but a better path might be AB or BC, then multivariable, then AP Stat. A good thing to discuss with a counselor.

There is nothing wrong with doing AB followed by BC. It's not uncommon and will build a strong foundation for someone who wants to major in physics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP back. He is in 9th. 8th grade MapM was 282. I am honestly in a new territory here because I have never had to worry about anything school related. We have always been very hands off with school with all of our kids. Older sibling took regular precalculus in 10th but in a different district. Never had any tutors for math or any of the AP courses. Older sibling is in an engineering program at UMD. This DS, middle child, also wants to be a physicist. He is worried that moving down to regular precalculus will be counted against him during college admissions. He wanted to take Calculus AB in 10th, BC in 11th and AP stats in 12th. He took Algebra 1 in 6th during COVID years but did AoPS Algebra 1 concurrently, so if he has gaps they have to be from Algebra 2. I will try to persuade him to take regular precalculus.

While it's great to have a plan, I wouldn't want one of my students to risk being unhappy and stressed in Honors PC on the belief that he wants to be physicist major 4 years from now. It's quite possible that his interests may change. (He hasn't even had high school physics yet.) On the other hand, if hard work and a tutor can help him persevere without ill effect, then Honors PC could work out fine.

I do question a year of AB followed by a year of BC. Except for a few objectives, BC is the same course as AB for 8 units before the 2 units that are exclusive to BC. In other words, he would get the entire AB course all over again while in BC. Not a tragedy, but a better path might be AB or BC, then multivariable, then AP Stat. A good thing to discuss with a counselor.

There is nothing wrong with doing AB followed by BC. It's not uncommon and will build a strong foundation for someone who wants to major in physics.

BC after AB should be a semester, not a year. It's extremely repetitive otherwise. Redoing all of AB from the same angle with the same test and homework is a poor use of time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are at Wootton in Honors PreCalc as well. The teacher is very intimidating and explained at BTS night that this will be a hard class. She said real math starts now and everything prior to this did not count. I was scared leaving BTS night. We have a tutor now once a week via Zoom. Not sure if it will help as we just started. NHS and advisory period can be used for help as well. Or before school this particular teacher is there for visits.

Is your child complaining that assessments are very short like 20 minutes for 10 problems? This has been one of my son’s issues. That said I do not want to blame the teacher in any way, although I was scared too leaving BTS night.

I will. This teacher is putting his own ego above the students's learning, compensating for his own insecurity by lording over the students that he is better at math than they are.

My excellent AP teacher said that when he gives a test, he times himself doing it, and then gives the kids triple that time.

You are making stuff up. Why would you jump to that conclusion? Perhaps the students in question are just ill-prepared.

The students in question aren't unprepared at Back to School Night.

There's no "preparation" for gimmicky speed tests. That's plain bad pedagogy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
There is nothing wrong with doing AB followed by BC. It's not uncommon and will build a strong foundation for someone who wants to major in physics.

While there is nothing "wrong" with it, most of BC will be an exact repeat of AB. The BC curriculum and College Board materials are the same as AB, except for just a few objectives and the 9th and 10th unit. It's very uncommon at my high school to go from AB to BC. This year, no AB students have gone onto BC. In past years, it's been only 1 or 2. Most AB students take AP Stat. A few take Multivariable Calculus. We help our MV students with the few areas they need from BC if they've taken AB. That said, school practices can be different.

[Anonymous]

OP, what progression of math classes did your child do in MS to get to honors precalc in 9th? I suspect that the compression was too fast and he lost out of some key skills that are needed for precalc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP back. He is in 9th. 8th grade MapM was 282. I am honestly in a new territory here because I have never had to worry about anything school related. We have always been very hands off with school with all of our kids. Older sibling took regular precalculus in 10th but in a different district. Never had any tutors for math or any of the AP courses. Older sibling is in an engineering program at UMD. This DS, middle child, also wants to be a physicist. He is worried that moving down to regular precalculus will be counted against him during college admissions. He wanted to take Calculus AB in 10th, BC in 11th and AP stats in 12th. He took Algebra 1 in 6th during COVID years but did AoPS Algebra 1 concurrently, so if he has gaps they have to be from Algebra 2. I will try to persuade him to take regular precalculus.

While it's great to have a plan, I wouldn't want one of my students to risk being unhappy and stressed in Honors PC on the belief that he wants to be physicist major 4 years from now. It's quite possible that his interests may change. (He hasn't even had high school physics yet.) On the other hand, if hard work and a tutor can help him persevere without ill effect, then Honors PC could work out fine.

I do question a year of AB followed by a year of BC. Except for a few objectives, BC is the same course as AB for 8 units before the 2 units that are exclusive to BC. In other words, he would get the entire AB course all over again while in BC. Not a tragedy, but a better path might be AB or BC, then multivariable, then AP Stat. A good thing to discuss with a counselor.

There is nothing wrong with doing AB followed by BC. It's not uncommon and will build a strong foundation for someone who wants to major in physics.

Or bore the student to death and ensure they will not go into STEM. High school calculus is already taught in a rote procedural way focused on computations. Imagine having a second year of pretty much the same thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are at Wootton in Honors PreCalc as well. The teacher is very intimidating and explained at BTS night that this will be a hard class. She said real math starts now and everything prior to this did not count. I was scared leaving BTS night. We have a tutor now once a week via Zoom. Not sure if it will help as we just started. NHS and advisory period can be used for help as well. Or before school this particular teacher is there for visits.

Is your child complaining that assessments are very short like 20 minutes for 10 problems? This has been one of my son’s issues. That said I do not want to blame the teacher in any way, although I was scared too leaving BTS night.

I will. This teacher is putting his own ego above the students's learning, compensating for his own insecurity by lording over the students that he is better at math than they are.

My excellent AP teacher said that when he gives a test, he times himself doing it, and then gives the kids triple that time.

You are making stuff up. Why would you jump to that conclusion? Perhaps the students in question are just ill-prepared.

The students in question aren't unprepared at Back to School Night.

There's no "preparation" for gimmicky speed tests. That's plain bad pedagogy.

I agree, quizzes where students are still learning the concepts, but also designed to put them in time pressure are a terrible idea. Teachers should be considerate of giving a reasonable amount of time if they actually want to test student understanding.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP back. He is in 9th. 8th grade MapM was 282. I am honestly in a new territory here because I have never had to worry about anything school related. We have always been very hands off with school with all of our kids. Older sibling took regular precalculus in 10th but in a different district. Never had any tutors for math or any of the AP courses. Older sibling is in an engineering program at UMD. This DS, middle child, also wants to be a physicist. He is worried that moving down to regular precalculus will be counted against him during college admissions. He wanted to take Calculus AB in 10th, BC in 11th and AP stats in 12th. He took Algebra 1 in 6th during COVID years but did AoPS Algebra 1 concurrently, so if he has gaps they have to be from Algebra 2. I will try to persuade him to take regular precalculus.

I don't get being a hands off parent. Can you help him? If not get a tutor. Pre-cal is far harder than any other math. Our pre-cal teacher is very good and it's a very different teaching style with a textbook and a lot more homework. We are very hands on and a parent helps and reviews it with our child. I would not have him drop down.

Op here. I took precalculus in 11th grade 30 years ago. I cannot help at all with math. Our teacher uses a textbook and gives a lot of homework. I am willing to get him a tutor I was just asking if it makes more sense to just step down to regular precalculus. He is a 9th grader so he is still going to be able to take higher level maths.

If you have the time, there is nothing wrong with you learning the material along with him. Since you have a textbook, I would imagine it's likely that you can pick it up yourself by going at his class pace and thus be able to help him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP back. He is in 9th. 8th grade MapM was 282. I am honestly in a new territory here because I have never had to worry about anything school related. We have always been very hands off with school with all of our kids. Older sibling took regular precalculus in 10th but in a different district. Never had any tutors for math or any of the AP courses. Older sibling is in an engineering program at UMD. This DS, middle child, also wants to be a physicist. He is worried that moving down to regular precalculus will be counted against him during college admissions. He wanted to take Calculus AB in 10th, BC in 11th and AP stats in 12th. He took Algebra 1 in 6th during COVID years but did AoPS Algebra 1 concurrently, so if he has gaps they have to be from Algebra 2. I will try to persuade him to take regular precalculus.

He sounds motivated and that's what matters most. As such I'd encourage him to write down questions whenever they occur (before he forgets them) and then ask them to his teachers, peers, even here on dcum. Questions are important for figuring out what he doesn't understand well.