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Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

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Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#291

Post by cwkoss »

cauch wrote: post #212
light_hue_1 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They address that in the article: tutoring. One on one tutoring works amazingly well. I used to volunteer as a tutor. The students I worked with accelerated drastically. It's simply a matter of money. They do leave out some things: food + shelter. Many poor students have problems with nutrition and safe shelter, both of which make learning near impossible. The metro area I'm in is a perfect example of this. We have t…

They don't really address it: tutoring is OBVIOUS, everyone knows that tutoring works. The reason they are applying this measure is because tutoring is not doable. > We don't need to dumb down anything. We need to raise everyone up by investing in education. And we can also give poney to every kids.That's a nice thought but that is so deconnected from reality, which means that you are pushing for something that will…

We can tax corporations and billionaires. Building a functional education system isn't an unrealistic pipe dream, its an imperative for a well adjusted society.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#292

Post by WillPostForFood »

cauch wrote: post #228
zzleeper wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But then engaged parents will take their kids to Kumon, and rich parents will take their kids to private school. Their kids will then mop the floor against all other kids, including engaged kids without engaged parents, that would have benefited from more advanced classes. Is that equality?

That does not make any sense: without this measure, the kids that you are trying to save from moping the floor will ... mop the floor twice. Without this measure, the kids that are not able to follow classes that needs things they cannot afford will just fail the lecture and drop from school, from THE WHOLE SCHOOL. Without the measure, you have people who drop out of school and get a mathematical education close to 0…

I think you might be misunderstanding the system. In California, you had standard track math, and advanced or accelerated track. This measure gets rids of advanced/accelerated, and forces everyone into standard. Without the measure you have 5s and 10s separated, with the measure, you have 5s and 10s together.

But as the parent post points out, 10s either dominate the class, leave the class, or ignore the class and take math outside school. None of that help's the 5s, and all of it hurts, or is wasteful for the 10s.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#293

Post by themitigating »

1MachineElf wrote: post #58
mydriasis wrote: post #33

> Guess what? Children are educable. If you invest the resources of the state in poor kids and underrepresented minorities, they will learn. It is shocking to me that this has to be said. What in the world...

It probably needs to be said because of situations like that in Baltimore, Maryland. The city spends more than 97% of what other major school districts spend, and yet it's students are on average some of the worst performers: https://foxbaltimore.com/news/project-baltimore/baltimore-ci...

You are only taking into account one factor. Is the money being spent well? Do you need more money because of external situations that may affect a child's learning?

For example in a poor area with more crime a child may need after school programs, which cost more money, to keep kids out of trouble.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#294

Post by laichzeit0 »

javajosh wrote: post #232
cauch wrote: post #89

The author says > The idea that offering children fewer educational resources through the public school system will help the poor kids catch up with rich ones, or help the Black kids catch up with the White and Asian ones, is unsupported by any available evidence of which I am aware. I was wondering if some people are aware of studies supporting this strategy. I could try to dig them up, but I remember few studies de…

No-one does real intelligence studies in humans because it's such a third-rail in academia. Think "The Bell Curve". Some scientists seem to believe that intelligence is intrinsic. The analogy with dog breeds, with their different temperaments and capabilities, with individual variation, applies to humans as well. See Richard Haier: IQ Tests, Human Intelligence, and Group Differences | Lex Fridman Podcast https://www.…

Some people believe being homosexual is also intrinsic, despite identical twin studies showing contrary evidence. People like simple answers. It’s probably partly genetic, partly environmental. In other words, something worth studying further.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#295

Post by tomsmeding »

Disclaimer: European.

Is it not strange how in an article arguing from otherwise a very egalitarian, leftist viewpoint, when it discusses how students perform given more or less difficult classes, it somehow thinks the most relevant statistic is the race of the students? (Approximately, even, because American race designation is kinda weird anyway.)

Sure, socio-economic circumstances are correlated with race. (Unfortunately still in this day and age.) Not perfectly, but there is a correlation, so absent other data, it can be used as a proxy for the socio-economic circumstances in which the student grows up. But there are multiple problems with this:

1. If we are to lessen discrimination, the very first thing we should do is stop discriminating. Is this considered normal in the USA? Stop tracking race! And even if you do track it (or an approximation of it) to double-check you're not inadvertently disadvantaging certain minority groups, certainly (1.) there are better measures to designate minority groups, and (2.) one can do this without telling all the world about it and giving society even more fuel for discrimination. If people see other people treat people equally, and see that as normal, they will tend to do the same. We should lead by example, not start a discussion on equality with the worst kind of discrimination.

2. Surely there are better indicators for socio-economic circumstances than race? What about the salary of their parents? This is a typical measure in The Netherlands (where I live). Or even where they live. And if you say that we cannot track those things because that would be an infringement on privacy: how on Earth is tracking parents' salary an infringement on privacy but not tracking race?

Like, I agree that teaching less math is bollocks. But that's not the thing that surprises me most when reading OP.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#296

Post by eitally »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #236
misterbishop wrote: post #125

This just is a total misunderstanding of what's being proposed, and a hamfisted excuse to dress up reactionary stupidity as a defense of "Math". The changes aren't "refusing to teach kids math", they are a better approach to math. Modern approaches emphasize number sense (aka actual understanding) over formulas. Algebra has historically been a kind of gatekeeping in middle school between kids who plug in the formulas…

> changes aren't "refusing to teach kids math", they are a better approach to math Every mathematician disagrees. The Stanford professor pushing this policy has no math education. (She does have consulting gigs with school districts where they trade a teacher's annual salary for a few hours of Zoom calls [1].) I grew up in Cupertino and am flying back to the Bay Area. Every friend who is a parent is planning on circu…

Every mathematician disagrees because their focus isn't learning or teaching children foundational number sense and math concepts that will help them lead successful lives.

You guys are talking past each other, and the guidelines in question are aimed at the kids in primary math education, not academic and applied math, where your statement applies better.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#297

Post by scarmig »

duskwuff wrote: post #225
nsxwolf wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm almost 50. I've watched this scam play out my entire life. We've gotta fix the public schools, they said, when I was in public school. They said it year after year, generation after generation. It's never happening. We absolutely should allow vouchers to go to religious private schools and secular private schools alike. It's time to bleed the public schools dry and use their lots to build more housing.

It may surprise you to hear this, but intentionally destroying the public school system and hoping that the private sector will step in with a replacement is not a viable solution to public schooling. Private schools are not required to serve all students, either in a socioeconomic sense or a geographic one. Allowing public schools to fall into terminal disrepair does a massive disservice to those students who wouldn…

Public schools as they exist today are already in a state of terminal disrepair and do a massive disservice to all their students. Note that the original article is about public schools banning the teaching of algebra for all students before high school because too many students fail it.

Parents complain about this and fight against it but are ignored. So what are we supposed to do? There are only so many school board meetings you can attend only to get eye rolls from officials.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#298

Post by pessimizer »

bobthepanda wrote: post #62
avisser wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ironically, "educable" is tough for me to get out. It's a very mouth-full-of-marbles word.

Teachable seems like the more common word that would be used here.

"Teachable" has been a bit debased in business-speak/wokespeak. It now refers to a mistake or accident that can be learned from.

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#299

Post by pwthornton »

This is the way. Teach kids more, not less. Ask more of them, not less. If you need to lengthen the school day and school year to do so, do it. Do it now.

"So what should we do instead? Dallas came up with an answer: Teach kids more math instead of teaching them less. In 2019, Dallas Independent School District implemented a new equity policy that encouraged many more people to take honors math classes:

Many capable Hispanic, Black and English learner students did not elect to join these classes on their own or were passed over by their instructors. And their parents were often unaware they could make the request.

Dallas ISD, which serves some 142,000 children, took note of the disparity and in 2017 formed a racial equity advisory council — some of whose members had children in the district — with the goal of improving opportunity for all…It decided to move from an opt-in model to an opt-out policy in the 2019-20 school year. Since then…students cannot opt out [of advances classes] without written parent permission. The move has dramatically increased participation among traditionally marginalized children."

Re: Refusing to teach kids math will not improve equity

#300

Post by sandworm101 »

toast0 wrote: post #262
cauch wrote: post #89

The author says > The idea that offering children fewer educational resources through the public school system will help the poor kids catch up with rich ones, or help the Black kids catch up with the White and Asian ones, is unsupported by any available evidence of which I am aware. I was wondering if some people are aware of studies supporting this strategy. I could try to dig them up, but I remember few studies de…

> If it is the case, while avoiding the privileged ones to run ahead is not ideal, the alternative of doing nothing is even worse (which is in practice what a lot of people criticizing this measure prone: they did not have any plan to change anything before the subject was introduced). > I think that the idea is not to "dumb down" the kids, but to have a goal that everyone can achieve instead of a goal that is imposs…

Let me get this straight. We're behind the rest of our class and we're going to catch up to them by going slower than they are? -Bart Simpson

People who fall behind don't need a slower pace. They need to move faster. That means not just more attention but longer hours. But there is only so much time. A school wanting to maximize its graduation rate needs to spend less energy on teaching people who are good at a subject in order to divert resources to those who need more. That means, counterintuitively, that kids who are good at math should be spending less time on math, not more.

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