Reply to Does taking AP Calc freshmen year in HS give enough "bonus" points to make it worth it?

Forum Index » College and University Discussion

Reply to "Does taking AP Calc freshmen year in HS give enough "bonus" points to make it worth it?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]No. It might actually signal that the parent is driving the bus on math enrichment.  No reason a kid should take Calc before 10th. [b]Otherwise,  not really enough lower tier college math courses to take to fill out 4 years if math.[/b][/quote]

lol. You clearly have no clue. Look at some degree major requirements or department policies to get an idea. You can also repeat classes or place directly into more advanced classes.[/quote]

Actually, I know the curricula very well. You probably didn't understand what I was saying, or just have a unique blend of arrogance and ignorance.

My kid is a math major at a T10 (decided between 2 T10 and some other top schools,  so checked curricula with departments at all) and fulfilled all the math base tier requirements in HS. Top colleges may let you use college level work in HS to place out if lower tier or pre req classes, but they won't for upper tier, so if someone took AP Calc in 9th, they may run out of those base classes. It also won't look any more impressive.

And, there is nothing super special about placing out. Some like to retake. Mine went to a magnet HS with incredible math depth and wanted the placement. Was the right choice for her.[/quote]

Can you give a specific example on how a kid taking Calculus in 9th would run out of classes to take either in high school or in college? The assumption is that they can access introductory level classes at the local community college, and they could also retake some in college if they wish to. [/quote]

PP here. If multi/diffeq 10th, linear/elective 11th, they could try to add discrete for 12th, but that is a semester. Or possibly logic or complex if school offers, but these wouldn't get much and may not fill the gap. The ones that can help with placement are Calc, multi, diffeq, linear. We did not see any real options to place out of other classes. I suppose those could be used to help with narrative.  My kid (BC in 10th) took linear, discrete and complex in 12th. It would have gained her nothing to take BC in 9th, and she might have had a semester without a math or have to scramble to fill at cc. [/quote]

The OPs student planed to take Calculus in 9th and AP statistics in 10. So Multi and LA in 11th, then Diff Eq and Discrete in 12th.

You don’t run out of classes, no need to take the AB+BC sequence. Another poster mentioned that CCs also have independent study that could substitute for a class.
[/quote]
Sure you coukd do that, but I don't view AP Stats as a math class in the vein of the others. I also don't think it is a good idea to take a year between Calc and multi. My point was that doing Calc in 9th gets you no edge. Stats does not offer an edge or contribute to math reqs (even if you can get credit), and it might feel like a decrease in rigor.[/quote]

It really depends what the student wants to take besides math, but it makes more sense to take AP statistics before multivariable, which might be useful only if planning to take university level electromagnetism and thermodynamics. I wouldn’t count AP Physics C EM in that category.

Statistics will give exposure to areas that are not typically covered in high school, like counting and probability, essentially the first semester of the class, and it will help with science classes as well. It has its own issues, but in my view the right time to take Statistics is after Calculus BC. Often you hear that Statistics is not rigorous, I strongly disagree with this, it comes from either ignorance or from experiencing poor teaching in high schools. [/quote]

It's not poor teaching, poor teaching would be using calculus in an algebra based class. Imagine if the AP Physics 1 teacher started pulling out derivatives and integrals to make it more rigorous to the bewildered 9th and 10th graders. The best thing to do is to take a calculus-based probability and statistics class, which you won't find in highschool.[/quote]

Most community colleges don’t offer calculus based statistics. You’re arguing that if taking calculus early there won’t be enough classes to take, but don’t recommend statistics because it’s not calculus based.
You are actually using calculus in “algebra based” statistics class virtually every time you calculate any probability, but use a calculator to do the operation. If you want to understand the contents better, take statistics after calculus, it doesn’t mean it’s calculus based, it’s just the material makes a lot more sense.[/quote]PP here. I wasn't arguing that taking calculus early would lead to there being not enough courses to take.

No one uses calculus in AP statistics any more than the kids in AP Physics 1 memorizing and recalling the kinematics formulas are using calculus. It's just memorize and apply. If the teacher went into the calculus-based derivations, that would be bad teaching as most of the students haven't taken calculus yet (and even the ones who have rarely care about the derivations, and it's not on the AP exam), so virtually all teachers don't do that.[/quote]The kid doing Calculus in 9th would absolutely care about how things are derived and understanding fundamentals, they are not just going to memorize and apply.[/quote] This is exactly why AP statistics would be a poor fit, especially when compared to calculus-based university statistics. Statistics is a subject that deserves much more than AP stats + a few hours on YouTube and Wikipedia.[/quote]

Then your recommendation is to not do any statistics unless it’s calculus based. Most high school students don’t have access to that course so they need to do with AP Statistics or dual enrollment statistics. Both are more useful than multivariable in my view. You can supplement the course with other materials to get a better understanding of the contents.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics