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An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

scottaaronson.blog

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Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#51

Post by texaslonghorn5 »

chadash wrote: post #38
texaslonghorn5 wrote: post #13

Ultimately the solution is better STEM foundation at the very very early ages. Universal pre school would probably be very useful. Empirically [edit: n = 1 or 2], it seems that drilling basic arithmetic and then multiplication tables early in pre K and earlier elementary will give students a better intuitive math foundation to do algebra very well. That would enable everyone to go into more advanced classes at the sa…

Pre-K (4 year olds) seems a bit young for teaching multiplication tables.

In context I meant get really good at addition/subtraction starting pre K and then multiplication once +/- is mastered.

Though empirically, I don't know about age 4 but kindergarten is definitely not too young for learning up to 12*12. And once you figure out multiplication and eventually mental division, it's not too big of a leap to have one variable algebra with "move a plus to the other side to become minus" etc. The formalism can come later but it's fantastic to have some exposure to moving numbers and symbols around from an early age.

Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#52

Post by Miner49er »

daveslash wrote: post #10

Sorry for being out of the loop and asking a (possibly) dumb question: What is the stated reason that the CMF suggested these changes? Is it about budgets? Is it because some people might think these classes " aren't that important? ". The open letter seems to suggest that it's about closing gaps between privileged and less privileged - is that it? Honest question - I'm not trying to stir the pot.

From my understanding, they revisit this framework every 8 years. California is doing poorly in 8th grade math scores, so I think they want to make changes to improve that.

Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#54

Post by Bostonian »

School-Cotton wrote: post #4
lr4444lr wrote: post #3

Efforts like this are well meaning, but only treat symptoms. The major impetus for watered down curricula is the very rational fear that large swaths of the student population will fail if expected to perform at the prior standards of rigor. Schools are not prepared to hold back massive numbers of kids, drop out proclivity for students held back rises, and teachers will be poorly evaluated by virtue of their students…

This is a natural consequence of the American myth/narrative that everyone is suited for academic high school and university. Other countries simply sort people into different schools much earlier, and spend the high school years teaching meaningful vocational skills to those not on the academic track, rather than wasting everyone's time.

Yes, but if you do sort students by academic achievement, you will send a smaller fraction of blacks and Hispanics to academic high schools than whites, and a smaller fraction of whites than Asians, since there are differences in academic achievement by race. I say so be it, but currently many people assume that disparate outcomes prove racism.

Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#55

Post by legalcorrection »

lr4444lr wrote: post #3

Efforts like this are well meaning, but only treat symptoms. The major impetus for watered down curricula is the very rational fear that large swaths of the student population will fail if expected to perform at the prior standards of rigor. Schools are not prepared to hold back massive numbers of kids, drop out proclivity for students held back rises, and teachers will be poorly evaluated by virtue of their students…

When the utopian plans to elevate the masses fail, just bring down the elites instead. Equality achieved.

Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#57

Post by frostburg »

BitwiseFool wrote: post #40
texaslonghorn5 wrote: post #13

Ultimately the solution is better STEM foundation at the very very early ages. Universal pre school would probably be very useful. Empirically [edit: n = 1 or 2], it seems that drilling basic arithmetic and then multiplication tables early in pre K and earlier elementary will give students a better intuitive math foundation to do algebra very well. That would enable everyone to go into more advanced classes at the sa…

>"drilling basic arithmetic and then multiplication tables" I get the sense that such rote methods are no longer encouraged and a lot of the "new math" in Common Core is aimed at approximation and reckoning so that students won't rely on memorization.

If you want to teach people methods to solve equations, limits, integrals etc. speed with basic algebraic operations is necessary.

Facility with those methods is then necessary to be able to adequately follow important proofs and gain understanding of more advanced concepts.

I don't know how you would teach people important results in their fields (physics, computer science etc., I'm not talking about actual mathematicians) without those skills.

Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#58

Post by texaslonghorn5 »

FredPret wrote: post #28
texaslonghorn5 wrote: post #13

Ultimately the solution is better STEM foundation at the very very early ages. Universal pre school would probably be very useful. Empirically [edit: n = 1 or 2], it seems that drilling basic arithmetic and then multiplication tables early in pre K and earlier elementary will give students a better intuitive math foundation to do algebra very well. That would enable everyone to go into more advanced classes at the sa…

I wish we did probability with equal gusto as kids. I very occasionally multiply 7 and 6 in my head, but have to reason with probabilities and statistics all day long.

Agree. I think getting really good at addition subtraction and multiplication and then division/fractions is the way to go though. Have really strong math fundamentals and then learn algebra and then everything else is far easier to pick up.

Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#59

Post by [deleted] »

jimbob45 wrote: post #11
adamsmith143 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This makes no sense even as a well meaning. "Some kids are going to fail so we need to prevent other kids from excelling." Obvious BS from California

Okay but what if American children were subjected to the standards of Chinese schools? You'd see 70% failure rates overnight at every school in the nation. Surely, in that case, we'd see policies like these pushed even by white people. Likewise, the minority parents and schools simply see upper-class white schools in this country as we do the Chinese schools. I'm not saying that this is the best solution to the probl…

[deleted]

Re: An update on the campaign to defend serious math education in California

#60

Post by micromacrofoot »

poisonarena wrote: post #34
lr4444lr wrote: post #3

Efforts like this are well meaning, but only treat symptoms. The major impetus for watered down curricula is the very rational fear that large swaths of the student population will fail if expected to perform at the prior standards of rigor. Schools are not prepared to hold back massive numbers of kids, drop out proclivity for students held back rises, and teachers will be poorly evaluated by virtue of their students…

What happened in California over the last 50 years to make math scores plummet ?

Declining math scores can be tied almost entirely tied to economic disparity (which unfortunately tracks with race pretty closely). Rich kids are on track, poor kids are far behind.

Unfortunately I don't expect these changes to impact that. It will likely take more rich kids out of public schools and further widen the gap.

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