Reply to Russian School of Math vs. AOPS

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[quote=pettifogger][quote=Anonymous][quote=pettifogger][quote=Anonymous][b]What about for those who are not necessarily into math competition?[/b] My DC is in first grade has been doing BA online and with books and enjoys it a lot. I thought maybe could do a summer camp but concerned it might turn DC off if it's too competition focused and not as fun as the online version (he loves the comics of course). I just want to nurture curiosity and love of math and not necessarily competitiveness. RSM might be too boring?[/quote]
Many BA questions tend to be very similar to questions from typical elementary math contests such as MOEMS, etc. So if he enjoyed Beast a lot, then by extension he enjoyed many math contest like problems. The common theme is that both are a source of thought provoking and interesting questions.

Working through math competition problems doesn't necessarily have to mean competing live in timed contests with others. He can work on past math contest problems at his own pace at home without competing against anyone. All the AMC 8 past contests are freely available on the AoPS site. Just treat math competition questions like any other math problems, but with the additional benefit that they are typically more creative and challenging which will end up stimulating his curiosity and teaching him many interesting things.[/quote]

Thanks. I know the founder was also a math competition afficionado. But we have no experience with that. It might be that DC will want to participate in it and that's fine but we like BA because of what he learns, not to prep for competitions. Was just wondering if that makes us weird among BA parents.[/quote]
Not at all weird. The BA curriculum is extremely well done for the purpose of teaching authentic mathematics in an inspiring way to develop critical problem solving and thinking skills. While it's true that those who learn it thoroughly would get a leg up in math contests, that's just icing on the cake and purely optional. The main event is the wonderful mathematical content developed to engage and challenge kids.

Back in the late 90s, before BA was conceived, and before the main AoPS curriculum books were created, RR wrote the first two original Aops books (Volume 1 and Volume 2) which do indeed focus on math contest material (they are relatively small and sparse, introducing mainly content aimed at students who had some initial experience with contests). While these books are still great, they are a far cry in terms of teachable content from the subsequent AoPS core curriculum books, and the BA books that came after them (which supposedly were developed to supposedly ease the difficult transition that students had to make when diving into their first AoPS book, such as Prealgebra, etc).[/quote]

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