<p>I am an upcoming junior this school year and I was accepted into Pre-Calculus Honors. I am not the strongest math student and was quite surprise that I was accepted. I did very well in my Geometry class sophomore year, but only mediocrely well in Algebra II as a freshman. My teacher freshman year was horrible and I did not have the drive and did not believe myself to be good enough at math to teach myself the topics (I still kick myself for that, as you really can't blame a teacher for your mistakes). At first I was excited as Geometry had given me hope for future mathematics until I learned that my Algebra II teacher from freshman year was teaching Pre-Calc Honors :/. I'm conflicted as to whether or not I'm prepared for such a class or if I want to deal with that teacher again. My grade for Algebra II was an 87 or 88 and my grade for Geometry was a 97. </p>
<p>Other classes I'm taking include AP Bio, AP English Lang, AP US History II, Spanish IV, half-year computer science, and half-year economics. My extracurriculars include the fall drama, spring musical, two running sports, choir, Class Council, yada yada yada. Should I go forward and try to handle the course, or should I drop it and go into a standard-level Pre-Calc class? Thank you for your time! </p>
<p>(I realize that not taking one Honors class will not bar me from any colleges or anything like that, this thread is simply advice regarding if I could be successful or thrive in the class.)</p>
<p>I think you should go ahead and take it honors level, IF you feel comfortable with your AP load. When I took Pre-Calc, the first half was merely a review of Algebra 2 and the rest was trigonometry and intro to calculus 1, so figure out your honors sylabbus and perhaps get in contact with the teachers for both the honor and regular versions of the class.</p>
<p>But if since you obviously don’t like the teacher, study the material ahead of time and the class will seem like review (or just study the hard stuff and remember why your teacher marks you down…)</p>
<p>Anyways,
Best of luck! Hope my advice made any sense? :-)</p>
<p>I ask this because precalculus doesn’t involve much algebra. It focuses more on understanding math. In fact, lots of precalculus material is review (though the poster above gives good advice if your worried and teacher).</p>
<p>The only algebra intensive section are trig identities.</p>
<p>However, I’m not going to sugar coat it, precalculus is a hard class that I had to work in to get an A and I’m gifted" at math. </p>
<p>Answer my question and I can give you a definitive answer.</p>
<p>Pre-Calc at my school was not particularly hard. I took it after a sequence of geometry and trigonometry (algebra in high school). Pre-Calc is essentially a faster survey of the material at a little more depth. I mean, if you intend to take Calculus, Pre-Calc will seem like a cakewalk after that. But I mean, Pre-Calc really is not that hard.</p>
<p>@LordEango My specific weak points are usually careless arithmetic errors and certain applications of algebraic concepts (for example, I struggled with polynomials the first time around). And @sazhassan I was thinking the same exact thing, I emailed him asking for a general overview of the course.</p>
<p>Pre-Calculus, no joke, is one of the most unnecessary courses in our education system. You almost basically know the whole curriculum, as you’ve done most of it in Algebra II and Trig. If you’ve coped with that class, look for this class to be much easier. Besides, you wanna go for AP Calc later on, a class which I found pretty difficult, but rewarding. It’s more interesting than Algebra</p>
<p>Maybe my school is different but precalculus is our hard class and ap calculus is a joke. Maybe cause we’re over prepped lol. It was a college class I took too so maybe that’s why I found t hard. Whatever then :D</p>
<p>Anyways I think you’ll be fine of you already are familiar with trig and polynomials. My precalculus class did hard trig identities simplification problems. </p>
<p>Precalculus is a lot of review of stuff you know but your just expected to know it better. If you weak points are algebra then your in luck: precalculus barely has any! More conceptual.</p>
<p>It’s very similar (at least it was for me). Most of my year of pre calc was spent using the unit circle (cake walk), and doing trigonometric “puzzles” where you have to simplify using various identities (easy if you memorize the identities).</p>
<p>It depends on how comfortable you are with your current AP course load. Pre-Calculus, honors or not, can be a challenge for many people. I’d definitely have a talk with the teacher of the course and see if he can gauge whether or not you would be successful. There’s no shame in accepting your limitations, but definitely read more into the course and review the material to get a feel for it.</p>
<p>I’m taking Pre-calc over the summer and going straight into AP Calc AB in junior year.
Let it be known that by taking precalc over the summer, basically the school gives you the book and a list of problems (about 300) to complete due on the first day of school.
Now this is a path a ~30 take at our school each year.
The majority of people haven’t even started and there’s only 2 weeks until school starts.
I’m going to learn the entire course (which is an honors course btw, it’s a prereq for AP Calc) in 1 week. </p>
<p>I think you can handle it, don’t worry. I don’t know what it’s rep is at your school, but at our school it is known to be a baby class (even as an honors class).</p>
<p>What do you plan on studying in college? If you want to do engineering or physics or most STEM majors, I’d definitely suggest taking the honors version of pre-calculus. How is AP Calc taught at your school/what are prerequisites/etc.?</p>
<p>I’m not positive what I want to study yet, but definitely not engineering. </p>
<p>Our school offers only AP Calc AB and the only prerequisite is an 85 or above in Pre-Calc Honors or a 92 or above in regular Pre-Calc. Many people who take Pre-Calc Honors take the regular Calc offered and many people who take regular Pre-Calc end up in AP. Depends on the student.</p>
<p>It’s probably safe to assume your Pre-Calc grade is gonna be higher than your Algebra II-Trig’s grade. It’s mostly a review of that class, with slightly harder numbers and a few new topics here and there that are easy. You’ll be fine in Pre-Calc honors.</p>