Teaching Textbooks for Math 7

The new virtual school, Wilostar3d, is no longer using Aleks for math and now uses Teaching Textbooks. We have decided to move on as well based on our experiences with Aleks (see may post). The demo for Teaching Textbooks 7 was evidence enough that this programme is worth a try. Here are some brief preliminary observations:
What looks good:

• TT gives a clean and neat presentation (i.e., no annoying flash presentations, cartoon characters, multiple frames etc.)  Yes, there is a cat, but she offers "hints" passively without meowing or  pawing for attention. 
• Teaching is driven by strong visuals and solid audio.  The instructive visuals are simple and direct.  The audio is a clear male voice with a neutral North American accent.  His tone is agreeable, without a hint of frustration or condescention.  He is at times encouraging, commenting on the difficulty of a concept.
• The programme is very easy to navigate and it was only a matter of minutes before my homeschooler was breezing through a demo unit.
• There is plenty of instruction for multiple scenarios.  After the dearth of fleshed-out instruction in Aleks, it will be wonderful to have solid instructions at our fingertips instead of having to search out learning videos and practice questions (mostly from OnLineMathLearning).  I had hoped that my homeschooler would learn to independently seek out more-detailed explainations with this and other resources readily available on his learning dashboard, but once frustration sets in, the chances of self-initiation diminish.
• There's lots of practice interspersed within each unit.  Happily, it comes after the teaching of concepts (not before as is found in Aleks).  I would prefer that my dear homeschooler have more practice than required for concept mastery, but in my experience (with my other gifted children) it is difficult to encourage enough repetition to root automaticity, (perhaps this is generally true).  My boys, for example, who are considered "exceptionally gifted" by WISC-IV standards, have incredible--indeed unbelievable--difficulty with rote learning tasks (e.g., times tables, numeric facts) while having remarkable conceptual strengths.  (One (not the subject of this blog) is dyslexic as well and the gap between his lower level procedural and rote learning competency (incompetency) and his extraordinary conceptual strengths has proven show-stopping and quite impervious to remediation.)
• There is a workbook for practice so it is not necessary to rewrite the questions.  Since my homeschooler has a physical disability which affects his writing endurance, this is a very nice feature.  In his efforts to avoid writing tasks, he tries to work out problems in his head, but ends up not being able to follow procedures and hold all the necessary bits of information in memory.  He flatly refuses to use a scratch pad.
• By the end of the unit, there is some sense of accomplishment. 
• There is a placement test.  The math curriculum in Ontario Canada, for example, is behind that of American math curriculum in general.  This may be true of other Canadian provinces.  I have not yet had a chance to pick apart TT, but a comparison between Ontario curriculum expectations and those of Aleks MS/6 programme easily demonstrated this gap.  Discussions on forums by families moving between the US and Canada highlight this gap as an area of concern.
• My homeschooler had no complaints (always a good sign) and there was a notable lack of frustration.

Possible downsides:

• TT is computer-mediated curriculum, but it is not online.  In our homeschooling and learning practices we strive also to incorporate wherever possible new applications with Web 2.0 and 3.0 characteristics. 
• No automatic uploading of student results.  The student or parent (ugh) must track the grades.  A flash drive was recommended by TT, who encouraged diligent back-up, which makes me think that they have thousands of calls from sobbing homeschool mothers who have lost months of results.    For me, this conjures up the anxiety I have experienced using various programmes over the past decade, especially the high-stakes home-based FastForWord.  Scheduling back-up of grades is for me a giant step backwards.  I'm just hoping we can put some system into place which will aleviate this drawback.
• This is not cloud computing and I am concerned about being able to load TT onto multiple computers.  Although it is a resellable programme, there are only two home-based installations, although TT assured me that I can un- and re-install TT on my home computers.   Since we tend to play musical computers around our house, this may prove problematic.  I'm contemplating a complete flash drive installation so we'll have more portability. 
• It is hard to balance instruction with gifted learners.  In the classroom, gifted learners typically need only one pass with instructions, and third repetitions can be very stressful for them.  But gifted learners also come equipped with an array of strengths and weaknesses.  My gifted homeschooler has weaker auditory processing, weaker attention, and low frustration tolerance (both for multiple repititions and for not understanding).  So while he may benefit from repititions, they can also be a hinderance.  I'm just hoping that this programme isn't tooooo instructional.  My sense is that the student can control for the most part, the extent of instruction, but it is a fine line to tread.

ALEKS for math

We wanted to experiment with online learning so we chose Aleks, which is a research-based online math learning system.

Zach worked in Level MS/LV 6 because American math standards are ahead of Canadian ones.

The benefits of Aleks for us appeared to be:

• very easy to sign-up for a free one-month trial and to proceed to paid service


• non-linear curriculum is divided into areas (or pies), which can be tackled (for the mostpart) in any chosen order


• the skills to be mastered within each unit are clear


• the student can choose which are he wants to work on so it gives a little more sense of control to the user


• Zach found the Pie Chart motivating (e.g., "I'm so close to finishing, why don't I finish it?"


• It was easy to see what Zach had done each day (units completed and attempted) although time spent was not a useful indicator (i.e., we stopped to consult other sources for explanations or he worked independently and switched out to other more interesting tabs)


• It is a good tool to use to uncover where a student is in math. I would recommend proceeding until the student hits the proverbial wall and then it's time to get to work.


• It provides a good assessment of a student's learning skill set. I would recommend observing a student proceed through various areas and units to determine how well-equipped a student is to deal with frustration and seek out sources to learn independently.

On the downside:

• Zach tended to move into new areas when he was frustrated so it did not help him learn to ask for help (from mom or the internet) when he can't solve a problem


• some incomplete areas do not give new work even though they are not complete. There is probably a good reason for this, but it is not explained to the student so Zach kept asking "why am I blocked?"


• Monthly service is automatically renewed unless you cancel your subscription


• Zach learned quickly to go to review after completing a unit so that he would get the answers right and get the unit marked as complete. It was hard to convince him to benefit from testing his recall at a later date. This reminded me just how quickly kids crack systems to their immediate advantage. In Aleks, this glitch is overcome by testing which will adjust a student's mastery; that is, units that have been accomplished can reappear on the list if mastery isn't demonstrated during tests (or teacher initiated quizzes). Still, I think it is important to pay attention to how our children proceed through programmes because the process can affect the quality of the learning. (I guess the homeschooling mom has not been programmed out quite yet.)


• Aleks is very weak in teaching. It doesn't explain how to solve a problem before it is presented. Instead it shows you how to solve a problem in a few steps after you have completed it or gotten it wrong. But these are not explanations and you don't get any context, optional ways of solving a problem, advice about pitfalls, ideas for applications, nor any enriching (depth) content.


• When Zach hit the wall in Aleks, it was time to turn it off for days at a time until he could catch up cognitively with explanations from online videos and with practice in workbooks. It is definitely not a stand-alone math programme.


• I am not sure how Aleks would deal with the student who has mastery in some areas, but not in others. This profile is often seen in kids with markedly asynchronous development during the elementary and middle school years. It would be terrific if a student work on each area according to relative strengths and weaknesses regardless of the grade level.

See ALEKS for K-12