Lawsuit against "Discovery Math" in Seattle Schools • Hacker News Board

Re: Lawsuit against "Discovery Math" in Seattle Schools

#51

Post by flatline » Tue, Jan 26, 2010, 3:26 AM UTC

tylerritchie wrote: post #48

flatline wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny, I do those "cluster problems" in my head to solve most multiplication and division problems...I presume that I invented the method myself at some point during basic education, as these books are encouraging kids to do. The standard algorithms are great on paper but suck to do in your head for anything very complex (at least for me...) I can see the point though about disadvantaged kids having trouble with…

I think every mere mortal uses a variation on the "cluster problems" to do mental multiplication and division. But what about the lattice method, how is that better than the standard algorithm for humans doing math on paper?

Yeah the lattice method was pretty cool, I don't recall seeing that before. I can't see any value teaching this to a 3rd grader unless they're absolutely sailing along in math and curious to learn more. Even then, I'm not really sure of the point, how does it reveal anything about multiplication?

Re: Lawsuit against "Discovery Math" in Seattle Schools

#52

Post by WestSeattleDan » Tue, Jan 26, 2010, 7:14 AM UTC

tylerritchie wrote: post #22

anigbrowl wrote: post #13

A pity that the article does not include any excerpts from the books or detailed critiques of what's wrong with them. Examining a Discovering Algebra book at http://www.amazon.com/Discovering-Algebra-Investigative-Appr... suggests that the book is not so bad (though obviously this only allows previewing a few pages)...however, I'm unsure whether this is even the same book, since the OP doesn't mention the name of the…

It's the books and the curriculum. Just watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr1qee-bTZI and cry.

Try looking at a comparison of Discovering Algebra and Prentice Hall Algebra Here: http://www.mathunderground.net/PHvsDA/PHvsDA.html great ready to cry large tears.

Re: Lawsuit against "Discovery Math" in Seattle Schools

#53

Post by WestSeattleDan » Tue, Jan 26, 2010, 7:19 AM UTC

cabalamat wrote: post #28

olegk wrote: post #6

Welfare. These low-income and minority kids know they won't starve to death, they think that learning is "acting white". Here's the result. Oh well, better for the rest of us.

Finland has more of a welfare state than the USA. Finland also has better school achievement.

Minnesota has better school achievement than the USA. There must be something to Northern latitude icy winters producing improved academic achievement. Canada is also better than USA in math. Maybe not using the $100 million NSF grant created math books and a few other publisher clones of same has a positive effect.

Re: Lawsuit against "Discovery Math" in Seattle Schools

#54

Post by dobbse » Tue, Jan 26, 2010, 9:13 AM UTC

A Mathematician’s Lament by Paul Lockhart: http://www.maa.org/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdf

Persuaded me that the way I learned math is pathologically soul crushing; the way it's taught from kindergarden through university. The first two pages set up a nice metaphor: mathematics is argument and creativity and our traditional math education by memorization and rote repetition are akin to teaching music by reading and writing sheet music without first hearing or playing an instrument.

"No society would ever reduce such a beautiful and meaningful art form to something so mindless and trivial; no culture could be so cruel to its children as to deprive them of such a natural, satisfying means of human expression."

The rest of the article digs into some specific examples.

Mathematics instruction needs an overhaul and back-to-basics isn't The Right Thing.

Re: Lawsuit against "Discovery Math" in Seattle Schools

#55

Post by bitwize » Tue, Jan 26, 2010, 7:14 PM UTC

lutorm wrote: post #50

bitwize wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with rote memorization is that it gets results. You cannot do algebra until you know your times tables by heart, and how did kids learn their times tables in ages past, when men were men and went to the moon without the aid of calculators? Drill, drill, drill. Going on and on about the beauty of math is all well and good if your brain is wired that way, but when 90% of America's high school grads are stym…

The point is that if all you do is drill, by the time you get to the beauty, your students have already made up their mind that math is the most useless crap in the Universe. Motivation is a powerful force and unless people see that there's any point to what they are being ordered to do, they will comply with the smallest amount of effort they can get away with. And to say that they want to fall back on "what works"…

Saxon Math is getting kids numerate to a high school level where constructivist horseshit is not.

Saxon Math is largely drill and repetition based, with some practical applications like counting money and so forth.

Therefore, you're wrong. QED.

As for what American students in general are doing, drill and repetition were how it was taught in the mid 20th century, when America led the world in science and technology. (My father was given a pencil with no eraser in the second grade; the teacher told the class "You're second graders now. You shouldn't be making mistakes.") We abandoned that sometime in the sixties and it's been downhill since.