Question for those of you who are familiar with both Jacobs and Foerster Algebra

[Staci in MO]

I'll be starting Algebra with my ds next year. We've been using Life of Fred Fractions and Decimals, and it seems to be doing the job, so we're going to stick with it.

But, I'm a little nervous about using something so out of the box for algebra, so I'm thinking of getting a "real" algebra book, just so I can hold them side by side to be sure we're not missing anything, and occasionally pull it out for extra practice.

I like the sound of Dolciani (and I used the newer Dolciani in high school in the 80s), but I don't want to go through that kind of effort for a back-up program. I've narrowed it down to Jacobs and Foerster.

Anyway, my ds is very bright, but very right-brained. He does great at math when he can see the big picture or the reason behind it (hence the reason LOF is such a hit). He's also slightly dyslexic. The result is a kid who can do amazing feats of mental gymnastics to come up with the correct answer in his head, but on the next problem will foul up something simple because he transposed numbers, got the fraction upside down, etc.

I've heard that Jacobs is more "wordy", which he would like. But it sounds like Foerster might have more real-world application.

Does anyone have experience with both? Thanks.

[Staci in MO]

I see that this has been discussed before. Sorry. :blush:

I would still love to hear your opinions, but if you've already answered this in a previous thread, I probably just read it, so don't feel like you have to type it all out again.

Unless you want to. :)

[Deanna in TN]

My 7th grade son has used Jacobs Algebra this year. He likes it. I don't think that it is wordy. Each lesson has a couple of pages of explanation before the lesson, but I don't think that there is any rambling. In my opinion, it is a mastery program rather than spiral, like Saxon, which my son begged me not to go back to.

We are planning to do Jacobs Geometry next year.