Want to complete math at your own pace? Check this out

One thing I love about homeschooling is the wide variety of curriculum choices. If your child isn’t thriving with one math curriculum, you can try another. This isn’t a choice available for public or private schools because it wouldn’t be viable. With getting ready for the college entrance exams my son wanted to review Algebra 1 that was the highest math on the test. It made no sense for him to redo the same curriculum, so I hopped over to the Mr. D. math site and signed him up for the self-paced Algebra 1 class so he could work at his own pace and review as he took the test.

(This post is sponsored by Mr. D Math, my opinions are all my own)

Why did I pick Mr. D’s self-paced Algebra 1 you ask?

I’m glad you asked that question, imaginary person. I’m familiar with Mr. D.’s math classes, they’re high quality and give a lot of support if you need it. The video lessons are fun and engaging.

My daughter worked through the life skills class, and my friend’s daughter took the ACT readiness class.

It was an easy choice for me to make.

 

What makes the self-paced classes different from the usual Mr. D classes?

As I mentioned, Princess took the Life Skills class, and she had to be on at the same time every week to participate in the live class, or she could watch the recording later. Lessons were doled out a week at a time, which was just fine for her because she doesn’t like math.

Self-paced classes are perfect for the kid who likes math a bit more and want to move at a faster pace (or maybe the kid who wants a slower pace, Princess finds an outside deadline useful for keeping to a pace).

Self-pace was perfect for Batman because he just wants to review what he already knew. He could complete the math lessons quickly, and work through it all on his own.

Here are Batman’s thoughts on the self-paced Algebra 1 class

Ugh, trying to rewrite what he said to be the third person is making my frozen brain hurt.

The lessons are fun, and make the students laugh as they watch them. After watching the lesson, you go on to complete worksheets to practice what you just learned.

I’m totally giving up on this third-person thing. It’s not happening. I’m just paraphrasing at this point.

He liked being able to either just complete it with scratch paper and checking your work or printing off the entire worksheet and completing it on there.

Since it was just a review of what he’d previously learned, he just wrote it out on scratch paper. Then you grade your own work and see how you did.

Mom, I can see how that could be a bad thing because you could have someone who lied on their grading, but it’s nice to just grade it myself and move on.

He also told me all about the extra help sessions you can attend if you’re not clear on a topic. Actually, it was more of complaining because he didn’t like the emails. Important note, if you don’t want the emails, just hit unsubscribe at the bottom of the email. I’m going to go tell him he can do that.

I rolled my eyes a little inside, because for people who want the extra help those emails are a big deal. Since he was reviewing what he already knew, he wasn’t appreciating what a big deal that is.

The big thing he liked was open notes on quizzes

I used to think open notes is a bad thing, but I’ve come to realize in real life and the business world we have the ability to keep our notes with us to help us. What you need to be able to show is the ability to answer questions. Open notes won’t help you if you don’t know the material at all.

The other thing he mentioned to me was the ability to retake quizzes, and I agree, we work to mastery, so retaking material is common in our house.

His one downside was “It’s another program to learn Mom,” their college classes have an insanely large number of programs to learn, and by classes, I really just mean their sign language class.

I think any other time this wouldn’t have been an issue for him, but the 6 new programs to learn for ASL has thrown him.

I wonder if I should mention to him Mr. D has an ASL class?

Sign up for your own Mr. D class

While Mr. D started out as math class, you can see there are a wide variety of classes to take. Prior to the kids starting ACC, I was eyeing the sign language classes, and I still have a good chance they’ll take some of the test prep classes.