Best Year 9 and 10 Textbooks for Stage 5.3 Maths (1 Viewer)

[davidgoes4wce]

What are the best textbooks to use for Stage 5.3 maths?

Currently I have:

Cambridge by Palmer et al
Maths SignPost 10 (a book I bought off Drongoski)
I also have numerous study guides by Lyn Baker (Year 9, Year 10, Year 10 Advanced)


Considering (gettingthe newer version because I am picky):
New Century
New Insight Mathematics-Oxford (will consider buying this one if it seems a bit more advanced in content than the older version)
Pearson

Not too sure about the quality of:

Mathscape
ICM-EM (have purchased a year 5 version of that text before, it seems a bit repetitive the questions?)
New Insight mathematics-older version of text mentioned above (as I speak I think I will buy this book today for 2nd hand)

 

[davidgoes4wce]

My reason for buying the books is the Chapter Reviews from all main textbooks are pretty similar in terms of difficulty. With Year 10 being an important year, in terms of selecting subjects for Yr 11 and 12, students want to be doing well, and the review questions at the end of each chapter gives the student more practice (especially with the randomness in questions). I've never been great at 'selecting' random questions for my students to do.

My student In year 10 was not happy because she got 70% which I put the blame on myself, as that was the grade she got 'before ' the assessment going through Lyn Baker's books. However she did tell me she doesnt really put too much time for maths during a week only when assessments come close by. Mind you, I only see her for an hour a week. I have no doubt that if she went through 2 more papers/reviews she would have got a better mark.

 

[davidgoes4wce]

For anyone in Year 10 doing Stage 5.3, highly recommend you get this book:

http://www.booktopia.com.au/excel-s...kM1YSCyTbxLobkabyAGObDOEHGl5NV3BnvBoC833w_wcB

I guess with time limitations, had my student gone through those questions all, we purposefully picked the questions we wanted to go through ( i think about 75% of the relevant sections), she would have done better.

 

[Drongoski]

I personally like the old SignPost Yr 9 & Yr 10 (2nd Edn, circa 1997) very much. They may not have colour, beautiful graphics & illustrations and superior layout,but I just like their no-nonsense approach, solid material which has depth.

I find the newly-published Cambridge books by Stuart Palmer great too, with all the benefits of the latest in textbook publishing technology. And more importantly, it covers the current revised syllabus.

 

[si2136]

I personally like the old SignPost Yr 9 & Yr 10 (2nd Edn, circa 1997) very much. They may not have colour, beautiful graphics & illustrations and superior layout,but I just like their no-nonsense approach, solid material which has depth.

I find the newly-published Cambridge books by Stuart Palmer great too, with all the benefits of the latest in textbook publishing technology. And more importantly, it covers the current revised syllabus.

I agree, I also loved the old signpost books, very straightforward, but the questions didn't get really hard. But year 9 and 10 were quite easy anyways ~

 

[davidgoes4wce]

For anyone in Year 10 doing Stage 5.3, highly recommend you get this book:

http://www.booktopia.com.au/excel-s...kM1YSCyTbxLobkabyAGObDOEHGl5NV3BnvBoC833w_wcB

I guess with time limitations, had my student gone through those questions all, we purposefully picked the questions we wanted to go through ( i think about 75% of the relevant sections), she would have done better.

That link above is down, but here is another link:

http://www.pascalpress.com.au/excel-smartstudy-advanced-mathematics-year-10/

Alot of students on here seem to be asking a link for past tests/exam papers for Year 10. This book is pretty much up to date with the syllabus and there is a good mix of questions to go through.

 

[davidgoes4wce]

I also bought a copy of the Workbook for Signpost, otherwise known as the 'Homework Program' (it comes in a package with the textbook ) and Signpost is right up there in terms of quality with the Oxford and Cambridge.

The Workbook doesn't come with any answers so be prepared to slug it out if you don't know the method required to get to the answer. Reinforcements come by re-reading the section in the textbook. A little downside about the book, is the pages are supposed to be 'tearable' or 'rippable' and given to students as individual worksheets, I personally would have preferred it if they made the pages binded onto the book.

I honestly dont think you would go wrong in Year 9 or 10 maths, to even considering purchasing at least 2 of those 3 texts and doing the majority of the questions from these books. It will prepare you well enough for higher level maths in Year 11.

 

[davidgoes4wce]

I also went out and purchased New Century Year 10 Advanced from T & T's in Alexandria yesterday. They have a warehouse with a whole mix of HSC textbooks.

I love the way they have marketed the texts here: Year 7, Year 8, Year 9 (5.1-5.2), Year 9 (5.1-5.3), Year 10 (5.1-5.2), Year 10 (5.1-5.3). It's a great revenue raisers for publishing companies to produce 2 texts for Year 9 & 10. As a tutor I think you should just buy the advanced versions of Year 9 and 10 rather than both. I do currently tutor a student in the Year 9, 5.1-5.2 stream and the only way to go up, (most parents want their child to do 5.3 maths) is to do the 5.3 questions and advanced questions.

The New Century (updated versions) also has a link to the Geogebra links which is handy. I am still a bit of a novice with Geogebra and am looking to get better in that software.

I'm also considering getting the Pearson Mathematics S.B text for maths which I see is also a very good book.

As a rough ranking of the 4 main texts (new Century, Cambridge, Oxford, SignPost), there isn't that much disparity between all 4. Highly recommend if you want to excel in the course is to buy 2 physical copies, I'm not a fan of reading things over the computer or macbook, as it doesn't have the same feel with flicking through the pages, highlighting the text and putting some grind into it.

If there was a slight ranking of the books I'd say : Cambridge > Oxford > New Century > SignPost but the ranking between each of the 4 is like a coin toss unlike with Year 11/12 where there is a bit more of a difference in standards of difficulty/presentations of each text.