Combining Teaching Textbooks & Life of Fred?

[amtmcm]

Greetings!

The posts on this board have been sooooo helpful. From what I gather, kids love both Life of Fred (haven't read any complaints) and Teaching Textbooks, but TT is not as rigorous/in-depth as some would like. It seems most people think Life of Fred is rigorous since I've read several posts saying it covers the same topics as Jacobs and Foerster but doesn't have as many practice problems.

It also seems that TT Algebra 2 falls between LOF Beginning Algebra and Advanced Algebra. My daughter is finishing Saxon 1/2 and has done very well, but I believe she would do even better with a program that explains the why's and includes historical and life applications like TT & LOF. Has anyone combined Life of Fred and Teaching Textbooks? I read another post that someone was thinking about it, but no responses from anyone who had done this successfully. I'm thinking about the following schedule:

2009/10
Fall: Life of Fred Beginning Algebra (my DD can finish this quickly since some will be review of Saxon 1/2)
Spring: Teaching Textbooks Algebra 2 (lessons 1-86)

2010/11
Fall: Complete Teaching Textbooks Algebra 2 (lessons 87-130 = 44 lessons)
2nd half of Fall and Spring: Life of Fred Advanced Algebra

2011/12
Geometry - Maybe both TT & LOF concurrently?

Does this sound workable? Has anyone done it?

Thanks so much!
Ann C.
DD12: LLATL Green, IEW Elegant Essay, Classic Roots, Latin For Children, Rainbow Science, BF History of Science, Landmark World History, Saxon 1/2

[Teresa in MO]

I'm interested in hearing this also, as I was considering doing this.

[amtmcm]

Hi Teresa,

Are you thinking of doing them concurrently with 2-3 lessons from each book per week or one after the other as I have listed? I looked at the TOC for LOF Beginning Algebra and TT Algebra 2 but they don't match up that well so I thought it might be confusing to do them concurrently. I'm also not sure if completing LOF Beginning Algebra in 1 semester is realistic, but from other posts I've read it sounds like kids are so enthusiastic about LOF that they blaze through it.

Ann

[4wildberrys]

Well, my thought is if your dd is doing well with Saxon---why not combine Saxon with LOF? TT, honestly, would kind of be a HUGE step backwards in terms of terminology and rigor compared to Saxon. I am actually switching ds FROM TT/LOF combo to Saxon/LOF combo because TT is just not challenging enough for him and like you mention, LOF will give the "why's" and everyday applications of the math, while Saxon gives that constant repetition/rigor. ;)

[amtmcm]

That's an interesting thought... and definitely more affordable than TT. :)

Thanks!