<p>I was at a Barnes and Nobles last week and was really surprised to see that they carried the Singapore Math textbooks. One of the best curricular math series out there: does lots of problem solving, concepts, practice and it’s a lot cheaper than books produced by US publishers. It just doesn’t adhere to a lot of state standards (that happens when the textbook companies are very involved in the standards process).</p>
<p>Wow - everyone pointed out some factors to consider. Thank you. My concern is that my son may be in a college which only has a few honors courses. In the state I quoted the statistics for, it appeared from the newspaper article that the students didn’t have to pass another test, just go through the remedial course. If he is in class with these students I don’t see how the classes can’t be dumbed down so much that he really does not get much out of the classes.</p>
<pre><code> The remediation rate for the college mentioned is 37%. The state wide remediation rate is 57%. Another college in the state had a 91% remediation rate.
His major is English, so it’s not like a hard science or engineering, where there is a locked in progression through the courses for which students have to master certain concepts.
</code></pre>
<p>I now see why this state and other similar states give good scholarships to out of state students with high SAT/ACT scores.</p>
<p>My son took an evening calculus course at a local university when he was 15. The professor basically had the students memorize formulas and templates. No theory at all - just rules and templates. I was shocked. The professor was well-regarded in his research so it appears that he was taking one for the team. These students were in engineering programs and had to pass a four-course calculus sequence for their degree. I would not want to hire these engineers.</p>
<p>I had him take it over again in the day school (he already knew most of the material) and he had a great professor. If you couldn’t keep up, you’d flunk out of the course. He provided what you would expect from a professor - not a lot of hand holding, high expectations and some effort to challenge students.</p>
<p>I think that four-year university degrees should include a year of calculus (calculus for business or social sciences would be fine). Just as almost all degree programs that I’ve seen require a year of writing, typically Comp/Research and Literature.</p>
<p>Doing remediation is very hard from what I’ve seen. The love of math (I think that it’s natural in young kids) may be driven out. Kids may wonder what the point is. Or they may learn it incorrectly. Fixing that is very, very hard because you’ve lost their interest and attention.</p>
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No need to apologize. I was not one of the adjuncts who was good at the remedial math course (although I might object to “horrid”) that’s why I gave that one up. I had better success with some of the other courses I taught, where students were more open to being there, and hadn’t been contaminated by their previous poor experiences. I don’t expect to be adjuncting (or teaching) after this semester, but that’s a long story. </p>
<p>I get a laugh out of DS when I explain my theory that given enough indiscriminate slashing any rational expression [eg (x^2-1)/(x+3) - (x+1)/(x-5)] can be reduced to +1. Somewhere I have saved student exams which prove it, lol.</p>
<p>My daughter as a junior in high school is taking college remediation math courses to compensate for unavailable or substandard course choices. We live in a small rural community with limited resources. Her first semester junior year she took Algebra 090(?) as an online course, and now second semester she is taking 099 with her academic advisor stepping in as instructor. Next year as a senior she will attend a close to local community college for college algebra. Is this completely unusual. She took Algebra 1 and Geometry her freshman and sophomore year but the tiny school has had to integrate all 4 classes into a few math classes partially due to poor state standardized test scores. Before reaching high school she was testing advanced in mathematics and inconsistent and temporary teachers were leaving gaps in her skills. Will colleges see this as her serious attempt to become the kind of student they are looking for or will it stand out as some bizarre unexplainable detour from a normal hs education?</p>