Wednesday, November 28, 2012

BenchPrep AP, ACT, and SAT Prep: Review

After trying Kaplan, I stumbled across BenchPrep, a lovely site where you can choose to have access to a single course for a year or pay a monthly fee to study as many as you want. I've been using BenchPrep for two months now and I like it a whole lot. Pictured above is a snippet of what the site looks like - a simple, streamlined layout, cross compatibility with computers, smartphones, and tablets and lots of courses to choose from.



Pros:
  • Clear, well-written answer explanations
  • Easy navigation
  • Ability to complete the course from beginning to end or hop from section to section
  • Compatible with phones, tablets, and computers
  • You can access everything they have for a pretty low monthly price - perfect for some extra studying those last few months before a test
  • After taking practice tests there's a clear breakdown of which skills you need to work on
  • Ability to rate sections by how hard or easy they are for you, which is great when you need to concentrate on and quickly find parts of the course - fantastic for homeschoolers with busy schedules!
Cons:
  • Some of the courses don't have as many practice questions or tests as others - there are two ACT math prep courses and I prefer one to the other by FAR. If you're buying the monthly all-access version of BenchPrep that's obviously not an issue.
  • That's really it!

I'd recommend using BenchPrep if you're looking for courses that highlight strengths and weaknesses so real progress can be made. It's easy to see where you're at and there's no battling through section upon section of review before happening upon something you need to work on. In true homeschooling style, there are no limits on how long you take or how quickly you complete the work and you can study only what you need to practice without an effect on the entire course progress and grade.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Kaplan Test Prep: Review

http://www.kaptest.com/



I'm applying to college this semester, and while I've taken the SAT a couple times and have a decent score, I thought I'd try the ACT and see what happened. I got Kaplan's ACT course so I could have an easy way to keep track of what I've covered and how much time I've put into studying. Here's what I think:

Pros:

  • Lots of diagnostic tests - There are 6 tests, which is more than enough to get a rough idea of what kind of score you'll get.
  • Promptness of scoring the test and essay - They promise scoring to be completed in 3-5 business days, but I got my first diagnostic test and essay back, graded, in 2 days. 
  • Great layout and easy visualization of where you are in the course - At the bottom of the main course page, there are two bars that show what percentage of the course you have covered and what percent you have "mastered". Also, you can set a goal for the score you want, and that shows up on the side in a sort of pie chart which is great for easy comparison of what diagnostic scores you're getting, your goal, and the max ACT score. And there is a nice countdown to your test day where you can easily see it.

Cons:

  • "Guided practice" questions have no answer explanations.
  • Answers to the quiz questions are often not explained well - After you finish the quiz, you're taken to another page where the answers are explained.  Most of the answers aren't very clear and you'll have to open another tab to be able to look at the question and answer at the same time.
  • You can't redo the quizzes you haven't mastered.
  • You can't change your mastery level - To "master" a particular skill, you must get 80% of the quiz correct. This is substantial to a lot of people, but there's a huge amount of students who already have a good score (scoring in the 80th-upper 90th percentiles) and want to perfect it. Obviously getting only 80% of the questions right is something they're already doing and aren't happy with.
  • A lot of the practice sets are about "Kaplan Strategies", not actual ACT content, and although I'm scoring pretty high on the actual test content, I'm getting 40's and 60's on the "strategies", because a lot of the answers seem to be a bit ambiguous and not relevant.
  • No new strategies - Everything they tell you to do on the ACT is something I already used for the SAT or I've heard a thousand times.
  • This is just a nit-picky thing, but... the tutors in the videos are a little too smiley and script-y sounding. There's a certain amount of smiling and autonomy that is okay, and then it just gets creepy.
In the end, I would have picked a different course if I could have a redo. I'd recommend Kaplan for someone who is shooting for an average/slightly above average score or someone who is new to standardized testing in general.

edX

Okay, this is a little late, as one(?) of the classes has already started, but I've been so excited for edX to come out ever since I saw a post about it on MIT's Facebook! Don't know what it is? Imagine MIT OCW, but with grades and certificates for finished classes. Harvard and MIT have been working on this for quite a while now. This is a big deal. They don't have many classes up and going right now, but this and Coursera are for sure the next big triumphs for online education. I'm doing the circuits class as well as the introductory computer science class from MIT for some review.

Visit edX here!: https://www.edx.org/

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

How to Earn Scholarship Money

If you're homeschooled and looking for the best scholarship websites, look no further.

1.) Zinch - They've got a huge database of scholarships. Put in your information, and they'll match you to hundreds of them based on your demographics, location, interests, and skills. Also, if you win scholarship money through Zinch, these lovely folks will double your money when you send them proof. Seriously. Look into it.

2.) Cappex - This site has a lot of scholarships as well, and a great database of colleges and admissions trends. They are the best, easiest to navigate college information source I've found yet.

These two are my favorites and you'd never run out of the scholarship opportunities given by them. But here's a couple basic scholarship search sites.

3.) Find Tuition
4.) Scholarships.com

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Math Basics: Addition, Subtraction, Percents, Money, Fractions, and more

http://www.gcflearnfree.org/math
Practice addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, decimals, percents, money, and fractions.

Free Ed - Pre Algebra Course

http://www.waybuilder.net/free-ed/Math/PreAlg01/default.asp
Text, quizzes, assignments, and practice.

Virtual Training Suite

http://www.vtstutorials.co.uk/
A large set of free tutorials geared towards helping college students research more efficently in their area of study. Written by various lecturers and librarians from universities. Tutorials take about an hour to finish.

Microsoft Digital Literacy

http://www.microsoft.com/about/corporatecitizenship/citizenship/giving/programs/up/digitalliteracy/default.mspx
Teaches new computer users about how to get around on their machine and on the internet.

Visual Calculus Course

http://archives.math.utk.edu/visual.calculus/
Includes pre-calculus review, extensive interactive notes, programs, drills, modules, and quizzes.

Karl's Calculus Calculator

http://www.karlscalculus.org/interact.html
Free online calulator for calculus

Paul's Online Math Notes - Lamar University

MIT OCW Calculus Text

http://ocw.mit.edu/resources/res-18-001-calculus-online-textbook-spring-2005/textbook/

Text + Instuctors manual + Study guide. Access to videos.

Calculus - UBC

http://www.ugrad.math.ubc.ca/coursedoc/math100/notes/

Free calculus text from University of British Columbia

Calculus - Math.Darthmouth.edu

http://www.math.dartmouth.edu/~klbooksite/
Extensive calculus resource with text, worked examples, applications, tests, and practice

First Year Calculus Notes

S.O.S. Math

http://www.sosmath.com/index.html
Math review site: problems, explanations for Algebra, Calculus, and Trig

Whatcom Community College - Free Introduction to Trig text