Can anyone recommend a maths textbook

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Dd is year 8, school don't use text books but at parents evening last night her very nice but very new teacher recommended we get a maths text book

I asked if he could recommend a book and he said 'no sorry, I've only been teaching 4 weeks so i'm not sure -but a square is a square!'

So -can anyone recommend a maths text book that will see her through gcses

She will be doing edexcel higher tier

CGP books from Smiths tend to be good.
Tend to be organised as KS3 and KS4.

For GCSE look under the GCSE section in Smiths for Edexcel specific ones for GCSE. That way you know you will have everything 'necessary and sufficient' included.

For DD1 I used a 'workbook' as well which just had loads of questions with answers at the back (but no explanations). Saved me making up questions at times.

(CGP KS3 book for science is well worth it too).

Can you ask parents from the year or two above, as well? I've always liked Lett's revision guides; not sure whether they do textbooks, but the revision stuff is very thorough.

I'm not so keen on CGP, mainly because the jokes are so bad!

Agree, Lett's also good.

There is a difference in guides in how 'jazzy' they are, so have a look at the options and choose what will suit your DD best.

I don't know any parents with older children unfortunately

I know they recommend the letts revision guides for year 10&11 but he said a text book rather than a revision guide

He might not have actually meant a text book though.

The revision guides are pretty thorough, they just don't have reams of questions in them in the way an old text book might have had.

GCSE textbooks are crap at the moment because they were rushed out for the new spec, which then changed so they're pitched at the wrong level and full of errors.

The CGP KS3 guides and workbooks are ok, but a higher tier GCSE book would be too hard for her at the moment as she's only the start of Y8.

The internet is a good resource for maths. corbettmaths.com has got questions and videos.

That's not great advice really. How odd. Can you contact the Head of Dept to ask for recommendations?
Y8. So not GCSE yet? You won't get one book to cover years I wouldn't think.
Re GCSE. You would do best to get a book that relates exactly to the correct syllabus.

Apparently they are moving very fast and are on the gcse syllabus already god knows why

School is not exactly strong at communication but I'll try

Maths is always on the GCSE syllabus. Even kids in bottom set Y7 will be learning stuff that's on the GCSE syllabus. That doesn't mean that a GCSE textbook will be appropriate right now.

noblegiraffe, what is so special about GCSE? It seems like extension of what you learn. Why aren't GCSE text book isn't appropriate for yr8 child?

I had a look at past GCSE, and it doesn't look like it's that difficult. I am deliberately stopping my ds to go further now with maths, but doing GCSE after 5+ years seems a bit to painful to tolerate. Maths is so logical, if you get it, you get it, isn't it?

I would agree with noble

My DD2 is 'bottom set Y7', and yes she is doing stuff that comes up in GCSE such as working out angles from other angles.

But a Higher GCSE guide such as I had for DD1 would assume knowledge and competence that DD2 doesn't yet have. So on the one hand you could claim that DD2 is 'doing GCSE syllabus' but on the other hand the GCSE guides would be beyond her.

Irvine I assume noble is talking about a typical just started y8 child, not a top of top set. Anyway there is loads of maths that isn't on the GCSE syllabus if you want to stretch your child.

We're finding the CGP KS3 one perfect for Year 8.

I'd suggest the foundation level GCSE books from CGP would be appropriate. Get the matching pair "complete revision and practice" and "workbook". The first has the methodology and a few questions per topic, the latter has lots of practice questions, so they work well together. Will be excellent for learning the basics which you really do need as moving onto more complex topics is hard/impossible without the fundamentals.