How the study plan works, and how to change it

LadderPrep gives every student a personalized, week-by-week study plan that runs up to the test and updates from today's date every time it is opened. You see the whole plan on your child's Plan tab; your child sees a short list called "Today".

What goes into the study plan?

LadderPrep builds the study plan from your child's current grade, the test date if you add one, the Free Placement Test result if your child took it, the study minutes you set for each day, and the work your child has done since.

• Current grade. Lessons two or more grades below your child's grade start with a quick check instead of the video, unless the placement test or later work shows they need the full lesson.
• Test date (optional). If you add a test date, the plan runs through test week and includes full-length math practice tests and final review weeks. Without a test date, the lessons run in course order with no scheduled practice tests.
• Weekly schedule ("Usual week"). A new plan starts at 6 hours a week: 75 minutes Monday through Thursday, 60 minutes on Friday, and weekends off. You can set each day from 0 to 4 hours in 15-minute steps, and the week can total 15 minutes to 20 hours.

How many hours a week does my child need?

The hours your child needs each week depend on the test date and on what your child already knows. Before you sign up, the plan calculator on the home page shows whether all 67 lessons fit before a test date at a given weekly time, and the week your child would finish them.

If you add a test date, LadderPrep recommends a weekly time between 4 and 12 hours. "Compare hours a week" shows the finish week for each listed weekly time and marks the recommended one; when your current weekly time is on the list, its row reads "(now)". If your current time doesn't fit everything and a higher weekly time on that list does, the dashboard also shows the recommendation, for example "Recommended: 7 hours a week".

How does the plan schedule each week?

The LadderPrep study plan schedules the lessons in course order, so foundational topics always come before the lessons that build on them, and fills each study day up to the minutes you set for it.

• How each lesson starts. Lessons your child likely knows start with a quick check; most other lessons start with the teaching video. Both are followed by practice. No lesson is skipped (see how lessons work).
• No split steps. A quick check, a video, or a practice set always stays on one day.
• Built-in review time. Each study day keeps about 15% of its time for review of earlier lessons.

You can see all 67 lessons on the lessons page.

When are the full-length practice tests?

When you add a test date, LadderPrep schedules full-length math practice tests by how much of the course your child has been taught, not by fixed calendar dates. The usual targets are:

• Practice test 1: the first week in which about half of the course has been taught.
• Practice test 2: once about 85% of the course has been taught, or all lessons are done.
• Practice test 3: once all lesson work is done.

Here, "taught" means your child finished the lesson, passed its quick check, or had it marked Known by the placement test. Close to the test, the plan relaxes these targets; a practice test that still doesn't fit is left out, the Plan tab says so, and the calendar shows where each test lands. Practice tests are usually at least two weeks apart, and a new one can't start until 7 days after the last one your child took.

The most practice tests a plan can schedule depends on how many weeks there are from the day you set the test date to test week:

Weeks in the plan	Full-length practice tests scheduled, at most
6 or more	3
3 to 5	2 (the first and the last)
2	1 (the last)
1	none

Each practice test takes 85 minutes of that week's time: the 35-minute Quantitative Reasoning section, a 10-minute break, and the 40-minute Mathematics Achievement section. A "Mistake review" of about 30 minutes usually follows on the next study day. LadderPrep has 6 full-length math practice tests in all; the ones the plan doesn't schedule are optional after the last scheduled test.

What happens in the last weeks before the test?

No new LadderPrep lessons start in the final 20% of the plan's weeks, and none in the final 2 weeks. Your child can still finish lessons already started, and the rest of the time goes to full-length practice tests, mistake reviews, spaced review, and extra practice on lessons the tests flagged.

Test week itself is light: at most 120 minutes in total on the days before the test, and nothing on test day or after.

On the Plan tab you see the timeline, for example "At 6 hours a week, Maya finishes new lessons the week of Dec 14, then has 2 weeks of review before the test." Your child's view shows only how many weeks are left.

What can I change in the plan?

On the Plan tab you can change the usual week, change the minutes for a single day, or move a lesson step to another day. Every change shows a preview before you save it, and you can undo it.

• The usual week. The "Usual week" row "repeats every week". Before you save, the preview shows which steps move and which no longer fit. Past days never change.
• A single day. Tap the minutes on any upcoming day to change that date only. A day set to 0 minutes is a day off.
• Move a step. You can move a step to today or another day, and other steps shift to make room. A lesson step can't move ahead of the earlier lessons it builds on, or into the final review weeks. A practice test can move only to another allowed day in the same week.
• Work ahead. A switch, on by default, offers your child the next day's first item once today's list is done. Either way, your child can open any lesson from the course map.
• The test date. Change it on your child's Profile tab, and the plan is rebuilt.

What happens when my child misses a day?

When your child misses a day or doesn't finish it, the unfinished work moves to the next study day. LadderPrep never makes that day longer to catch up; later work moves to later days instead.

• No "overdue" for your child. The student view never says your child is behind or that a day was missed, and daily review is capped at 8 questions, so a missed day never makes your child's review list longer.
• A clear record for you. Past days on the Study calendar show "Studied 45 min" or "No study this day", and the Plan tab tells you when last week's study time was under half of the minutes set for the week.
• What moved. A card on the Plan tab and the weekly email compare the plan with the last report, for example "Lessons now finish the week of Nov 23, later than the week of Nov 16 in the last report".

What if not every lesson fits before the test?

When the study time before the test is too short for all 67 lessons, the Plan tab headline tells you, for example "63 of 67 lessons fit".

To decide what to leave out, LadderPrep compares each lesson's value with the time it takes. Value is how often the lesson's topic comes up on the test, based on a question-by-question analysis of official sample material; time includes any unfinished earlier lessons it would add to the plan. The lessons with the lowest value per minute are left out first. The plan always keeps every earlier lesson that a scheduled lesson builds on, and it keeps the quantitative comparison strategy lesson until the final weeks.

Scheduled lessons stay in course order, and your child can still open any left-out lesson from the course map. When more weekly time would fit every lesson, the card offers it, for example "Use 7 hours a week".

How long can the plan run?

A LadderPrep study plan runs until test week or until access ends, whichever comes first. Access lasts 180 days. It starts the first time your child plays a lesson video, answers a practice question, or starts a quick check or a full-length practice test, or 90 days after purchase if none of that has happened yet. Each enrollment can be extended once, by 90 days.