Pearson Homeschool- Algebra 1 {Schoolhouse Review Crew}

Here is the first Schoolhouse Review Crew product that I have been privileged to review this summer.

This review has a lot of screen shots, just a warning  

We received from Pearson Homeschool:
MyMathLab Algebra 1 Student/Child Access Kit- $49.97 (ISBN: 9780132939348)
MyMathLab Parent Access Kit- $30.00 (ISBN: 9780132939317)
The access kits look the same but one says “parent”, the other “student”. These come to you as simple cardboard mailers.
This is a program geared toward middle and high school students working on Algebra 1. My son has just finished the 7th grade so majority of this will be completed during his 8th grade year.
Key features and benefits from the website {emphasis mine}:

• Ready to use out-of-the-box or choose to create your own lessons and assignments
• Fully interactive eText
• Robust multimedia library with videos and animations to improve understanding
• Personalized learning based on quiz and test results
• Easy-to-create online homework, quizzes, and tests that are automatically-graded
• Immediate feedback for all your child’s work

I should add also that the access is for 18 months to the site and course. You can see the contents of the Algebra 1 here. It consists of 10 Units, each unit {which is a ‘chapter’} has a mid-chapter quiz and an end of chapter test.

Where to start with this... First you have to register with your access codes. The registration process is somewhat difficult to figure out. It is written out step-by-step on the cards that you receive but honestly, the steps are not the same. You can visit pearsonmylab.com/howtoregister for a video tutorial to help with this. There are some minor differences that will either make you shake your head or you may not even notice (if it all runs smoothly for you). I was in the first category. I tell you this because it could very well affect how you feel about this program. At first.

this is what it will look like when you have successfully added your course. It will have a number after the “course ID” {for some reason I’d blocked mine out of this image}. This is what you will see whether you log into the parent or student account.

clicking on the name will take you to this screen. At first, in my opinion, it’s confusing. There are “Getting Started” tutorials for both parents and students on how to use the program. If you log in with the parent account, your screen will most likely show this each time. At first I was confused that there was no activity when I know my son had completed assignments- this is *your* page- not theirs. If *you* do the work it *will* show up here. Logging into the student account will show the same ‘page’ just different results {without a Control Panel option}.

this is Fox’s recent activity. Or the next screen is accessed by clicking Check Your Progress on the left sidebar…

Going back to the parent account…

this is an important screen! The Control Panel (accessed from the previous screen) will give you access to many different things. I still didn’t get them all figured out at the time of this posting. Mostly I use the links under “MyMathLab”- Gradebook, Study Plan Manager, Homework/Test Manager.

clicking Gradebook brings me here. I can then select the student I wish to view the progress of.

Once I’d figured out how to add my course, I registered my son {that went smoothly}. From here I was able to choose what to include or omit from his assignments. This is set up to be continuous. If you start at the beginning {which we sort of did since we are at the end of our school year but not very far into Algebra 1}, then each assignment would be done in order and the program automatically tells what is next.

There is very little that the parent really needs to do with this. The reasons that I could see that the study plan would be changed is if the program is being used for review or if it is started mid-year {or mid-subject}. I didn’t go that route so I don’t know really how easy that is. For us I did omit a few lessons because after doing the Pre-Test, Fox really didn’t need to cover all of them to move forward.

from the Parent Guide from Pearson. It shows what it will look like when a lesson has been mastered {the cap} or needs more review {pencil}.

this shows some of the work that has been completed {near the beginning of our subscription} but the real reason I’ve taken this screenshot is to show the omitted lessons {in gray}.

here’s another view of all the assignments. From this screen you have the option of doing things with the assignments. See the next screen…

this {from the Parent Guide} shows how to change the prerequisites for lessons in case you’ve omitted some that were required before moving on. You would click on “Set Prerequisites” on almost any of the previous screens will allow you to change them. I had to do this with Lesson 5 because it would not allow the student to continue without reaching mastery of the previous lesson- which I’d omitted.

The assignments are ordered automatically {unless you change them} so the student continues on. I’ve not set any due dates but do require him to work on math each day {I think the average amount of time might be 20-25 minutes}. I like that he can log in and pretty much do the assignments without me there to help him. He has needed some assistance a time or two but generally he has all he needs built right in.

above is an assignment page. You can see that on the left are two links; these are for the ‘media’ for the lesson. See next screen shot..

this little box shows up when working on Questions, on the right of the question. The student can click on these to help with the problem. We didn’t use Ask My Instructor or Print.

Now after all those pictures, here’s what I found to be not-so-good and good.
Cons:

• Very difficult to navigate and find things; not very user friendly. Even after trying to troubleshoot what I was doing wrong by following tutorials, I could not because the instructions were not quite right. I just really had a difficult time with navigating all the possible goodies this program purported to have.
• You really just need to click all the buttons to figure out what they do. Or you could try to contact Customer Service {I did *not* do that even once}. I went all over the site trying to figure it out. My best source for figuring it out was others using the program- asking them what they’d done.

Pros:

• All-inclusive. It includes the text, videos, automatic results. It is the teacher. Or it can definitely be if you want it to be! {that’d be me}
• It has so many features that it is mind-boggling. Although it is difficult to find your way around, once you have figured out what is where it is relatively easy to ‘fix’ it the way you want it.
• You can delete assignments, unassign them, change the score, change the “mastery” percentage of all tasks, count some assignments and not others. I mean there really is just so much to do! You can also change how the scores of work affects the overall grade {the weight}.

from the Parent Guide.

Pearson Homeschool also offers curriculum for K-12 in just about all subject areas.

Contact information:
Website: Pearson Homeschool
Contact: Form on their website
Customer Service: 1-888-695-6577
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Bottom line:

I’ll be very honest with you- I did not like this program when we first started. It was confusing, frustrating and it seems there is a lot of clicking needed to get things done. I had a difficult time getting it set up so that my son could skip some lessons. My ds, who dislikes math anyway, also was very frustrated with this at the start. The learning curve just for the program is very sharp. But… since we’ve used it, it’s grown on us.

I feel now that this is worth the time it took us to get acclimated to the program. I can check his progress. I can see how many times he attempts a problem, an assignment or a quiz or test. I can change how often he can attempt those things. I can change what I consider mastery (I’m happy with the default 90% personally). He can access videos and other aids to help him learn. He can see the results of his work automatically. He is motivated to reach ‘mastery’, I think, partially because of this. He still doesn’t really like math but this takes the sting out a little. He doesn’t have to rely on *my* math knowledge to help him when he hits a wall.

I would love to see a more detailed, accurate step-by-step tutorial on how to use all that this program offers. In visual form, not just written. I still get annoyed with some aspects of it but overall, I am content.

I would recommend this to others who are looking for an Algebra 1 math program that is the best of both worlds {can be done as is or can be changed to suit}, can be done at a moderate pace {or as quick as one wants}, and is relatively well priced {for 18 months it is less than $5 a day for one student and one parent access kit}.

Have a read of what others on the Schoolhouse Review Crew had to say about this and other Pearson Homeschool products.

***Disclaimer: I received the above access kits and subscription for Algebra 1 from Pearson Homeschool via the Schoolhouse Review Crew for free in exchange for an honest review. No compensation was given. All opinions stated are my own or those of my family. I only recommend products that I truly feel will be beneficial to others based on my experiences. See Disclosure/Policies.***