Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My controversial hot take is that high school is when you should stop worrying about “mild dyscalculia” and just accept that math isn’t your kid’s strongest subject. Do what you need to do to keep their grades decent but doesn’t make a ton of sense to focus all your money and time on their weakest subject.

Yeah, no. I strongly disagree about that sort of educational abandonment. My kid with dyscalculia went as far as AP Calc BC in 12th grade, which was a notable achievement for him, and was able to skip the required freshman math course and do more of what actually interested him in college. More importantly, twisting his brain to solve math problems was good for him. He probably rewired his neuronal pathways significantly during his high school math progression. I wanted him to practice problem-solving, because of the lifelong benefits to all aspect of his life, and math is an excellent vehicle for that.

Oh it’s you. I don’t think it helps things when you bring up your kid who clearly had no actual disability related to math. I don’t know why you got so attached to the “dyscalculia” label but your input is not helpful to those of us who have kids that legitimately struggle with math.

Meanwhile, it is also a kind of “educational abandonment” to focus all of your resources on your child’s weaknesses to the neglect of their strengths and other import things (like everything else they could be doing over the summer instead of math).

Why are you attacking the PP, when it sounds like you've attacked them before as well? There are many forms of dyscalculia. Some are milder than others. They all necessitate remediation.

You sound really... aggressive.

Because PP posts on every dyscalculia thread with the nonsensical story about her kid with a math disability who did calculus BC - and of course PP started it by claiming I was advocating for “educational abandonment.” PP has a very weird understanding of disability.

Different poster: I agree that you are attacking someone who was trying to make a point that if your kid wants to study in college for any stem or stem related field, basic Calculus is required. Your kid may not want that, that’s ok. The other poster’s child worked hard and was able to achieve something valuable to them, that doesn’t mean they didn’t have a disability.
If you didn’t like the “educational abandonment” wording, ok just say so. It’s fair for them to bring up as many people deny students with disabilities the right to take AP & post-AP classes in high school saying “they don’t have a disability if they can take X class in Highschool”…I have heard teachers claim they shouldn’t have to follow a 504 if the student is capable of being in “their class”. It’s utter BS.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My controversial hot take is that high school is when you should stop worrying about “mild dyscalculia” and just accept that math isn’t your kid’s strongest subject. Do what you need to do to keep their grades decent but doesn’t make a ton of sense to focus all your money and time on their weakest subject.

Yeah, no. I strongly disagree about that sort of educational abandonment. My kid with dyscalculia went as far as AP Calc BC in 12th grade, which was a notable achievement for him, and was able to skip the required freshman math course and do more of what actually interested him in college. More importantly, twisting his brain to solve math problems was good for him. He probably rewired his neuronal pathways significantly during his high school math progression. I wanted him to practice problem-solving, because of the lifelong benefits to all aspect of his life, and math is an excellent vehicle for that.

Oh it’s you. I don’t think it helps things when you bring up your kid who clearly had no actual disability related to math. I don’t know why you got so attached to the “dyscalculia” label but your input is not helpful to those of us who have kids that legitimately struggle with math.

Meanwhile, it is also a kind of “educational abandonment” to focus all of your resources on your child’s weaknesses to the neglect of their strengths and other import things (like everything else they could be doing over the summer instead of math).

Why are you attacking the PP, when it sounds like you've attacked them before as well? There are many forms of dyscalculia. Some are milder than others. They all necessitate remediation.

You sound really... aggressive.

Because PP posts on every dyscalculia thread with the nonsensical story about her kid with a math disability who did calculus BC - and of course PP started it by claiming I was advocating for “educational abandonment.” PP has a very weird understanding of disability.

Anonymous wrote:How on earth are you getting your middle and high schoolers to sit in a Chair and concentrate and do an assignment!? My 15 year old would never in a million years do something that I requested her to do like this. And that is even with Ritalin. What is it like to have a compliant child!?

Anonymous wrote:I am a parent. I paid for IXL for one year as a learning aid. My two sons had already used the math portion through their school district (so they knew the tool). My sons wouldn't spend time on it at home without me nagging them, so I switched them to far more expensive in-person Mathnasium tutoring. I've written posts about this in the past.

I can corroborate that the student diagnostic for my older son matched the Mathnasium pre-test. Both identified the same areas of weakness. And both use drills to reinforce concepts. Mathnasium offers a classroom type model where one tutor helps multiple kids who are working on worksheets chosen to build their skills in a tailored order. IXL just offers explanations and if those are not sufficient, you must tutor your child.

When my kids' school district had IXL, I didn't get involved with the kids completing the units. I hadn't seen the parent diagnostic features. And the kids were assigned IXL mainly in the summer as a supposed learning loss avoidance measure that failed. So, I didn't leverage it correctly.

Bottom line, if I had really looked at IXL carefully AND had compliant children, it would have been worth it for tutoring and practice. A year cost less than a week of Mathnasium.

Here's what I recommend. Subscribe for six months to IXL math only. Incentivize your kid to do a lot of modules. Check to make sure your kid is doing 8th grade common core...if your kid is needing to drop down to 4th/5th grade on some skills...that's not weird at all. My 7th grader had forgotten how to do long division by hand. Whatever the kid scores badly at, move him down grade settings manually to practice related skills at a lower grade level. You could even start out at 6th grade and see how that goes.

Also...Very Important...make sure your kid only has to get a score of 80 or 90 on a module then they can stop. One of the most annoying things about IXL is that it's very difficult to get high scores/100s. Kids don't want to spend 30 minutes more to complete a module perfectly vs. a 90. The less frustrating they find completing modules, the faster you will be able to see patterns and be able to guide them to the areas where they have weak spots.

If for any reason you feel that you won't be able to interpret the math terminology used to describe the learning units (e.g., prime number, factor, commutative property), then maybe you'll have difficulty. But I think anyone who's been to college and at least taken Algebra should be able to refresh their knowledge.

Also make sure that your kid can still speed run math facts (multiplication tables, etc.), order of operations - PEMDAS, and can work with fractions. These are trouble spots. Truthfully kids don't get enough practice with these, unless they are naturally good at math in elementary school.

P.S. I had an added use for IXL. My younger one who wouldn't do the math ended up using it to catch up in 7th grade Spanish. That was a low-cost add-on module. I tacked it on to his brother's subscription because his brother didn't need Spanish 1.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My controversial hot take is that high school is when you should stop worrying about “mild dyscalculia” and just accept that math isn’t your kid’s strongest subject. Do what you need to do to keep their grades decent but doesn’t make a ton of sense to focus all your money and time on their weakest subject.

Yeah, no. I strongly disagree about that sort of educational abandonment. My kid with dyscalculia went as far as AP Calc BC in 12th grade, which was a notable achievement for him, and was able to skip the required freshman math course and do more of what actually interested him in college. More importantly, twisting his brain to solve math problems was good for him. He probably rewired his neuronal pathways significantly during his high school math progression. I wanted him to practice problem-solving, because of the lifelong benefits to all aspect of his life, and math is an excellent vehicle for that.

Oh it’s you. I don’t think it helps things when you bring up your kid who clearly had no actual disability related to math. I don’t know why you got so attached to the “dyscalculia” label but your input is not helpful to those of us who have kids that legitimately struggle with math.

Meanwhile, it is also a kind of “educational abandonment” to focus all of your resources on your child’s weaknesses to the neglect of their strengths and other import things (like everything else they could be doing over the summer instead of math).

Why are you attacking the PP, when it sounds like you've attacked them before as well? There are many forms of dyscalculia. Some are milder than others. They all necessitate remediation.

You sound really... aggressive.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My controversial hot take is that high school is when you should stop worrying about “mild dyscalculia” and just accept that math isn’t your kid’s strongest subject. Do what you need to do to keep their grades decent but doesn’t make a ton of sense to focus all your money and time on their weakest subject.

Yeah, no. I strongly disagree about that sort of educational abandonment. My kid with dyscalculia went as far as AP Calc BC in 12th grade, which was a notable achievement for him, and was able to skip the required freshman math course and do more of what actually interested him in college. More importantly, twisting his brain to solve math problems was good for him. He probably rewired his neuronal pathways significantly during his high school math progression. I wanted him to practice problem-solving, because of the lifelong benefits to all aspect of his life, and math is an excellent vehicle for that.

Oh it’s you. I don’t think it helps things when you bring up your kid who clearly had no actual disability related to math. I don’t know why you got so attached to the “dyscalculia” label but your input is not helpful to those of us who have kids that legitimately struggle with math.

Meanwhile, it is also a kind of “educational abandonment” to focus all of your resources on your child’s weaknesses to the neglect of their strengths and other import things (like everything else they could be doing over the summer instead of math).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My controversial hot take is that high school is when you should stop worrying about “mild dyscalculia” and just accept that math isn’t your kid’s strongest subject. Do what you need to do to keep their grades decent but doesn’t make a ton of sense to focus all your money and time on their weakest subject.

Yeah, no. I strongly disagree about that sort of educational abandonment. My kid with dyscalculia went as far as AP Calc BC in 12th grade, which was a notable achievement for him, and was able to skip the required freshman math course and do more of what actually interested him in college. More importantly, twisting his brain to solve math problems was good for him. He probably rewired his neuronal pathways significantly during his high school math progression. I wanted him to practice problem-solving, because of the lifelong benefits to all aspect of his life, and math is an excellent vehicle for that.

Anonymous wrote:My controversial hot take is that high school is when you should stop worrying about “mild dyscalculia” and just accept that math isn’t your kid’s strongest subject. Do what you need to do to keep their grades decent but doesn’t make a ton of sense to focus all your money and time on their weakest subject.