I have kid in middle school and I was wondering on getting kid started on AMC. Any advise on how to get started? Any study/prep classes can he take. My second one has lot of interest in Math. Would love to take advise from experienced parents who have gone with the high school kids. Thanks for all your help and I keep coming here to get great information!!
Some middle schools have math clubs that use Art of Problem Solving
https://artofproblemsolving.com/community/c3158_usa_contests
Can do yourself, or invite friends.
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MathCounts is a middle school local/state/national contest. See if your middle school participates. If not, your student can still participate as an independent.
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Thanks so much!
Another recommendation for Art of Problem Solving. They are so good that almost all of the top math kids up in the USA have used them. And the instructors my son has had have been uniformly excellent.
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great advice!!
If you live near a university, you could look into whether they have a math circle. Our local one administers the AMC and organizes ARML teams for competition. As an example, you can explore the Stanford Math Circle website to get an idea of resources and offerings.
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sounds good, I will check! Thanks for sharing link
AoPS is certainly the place to start. They used to have a list of math circles/teams/organizations by geography. If they still do, this is a great place to start. AoPS provides very good forums, courses, old tests and other resources, but in-person participation with like-mind students is the best path, if available.
Also see if your local school is involved in, or is interested in being involved in, MathCounts, Math League, or a math club.
D22 first got interested when her 8th grade gifted program offered the AMC8, but a regional math team sponsored by the math department at a local college was by far the best resource/experience. They can be hard to find (ours had about 30 students in a metro area of 2.5 million), but worth it.
At a minimum, get the AoPS Volume 1 to see how much interest there is. My daughter was fascinated by it.
For a course, I suggest the AoPS Intro Number Theory course. It’s a topic that is very unlikely to be covered in the standard high school curriculum. D shared the content with a college friend who graduated CMU Math and he said he didn’t cover the material until Sophomore year in college. She got a kick out of that.
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Your daughter is very smart! I am sure she put in lot of hard work for it ! This is amazing information. I will get him enrolled in AoPS. I will look for in person center or option as well. I will check with his middle school if they have local clubs like you suggested. Thanks so much!!
AMC8 (and AMC10 for that matter) are at a completely different level than Math Olympiad.
The easiest place to start is likely to buy a book of past problems and have her work through them. (To add: I have a half dozen of them myself)
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