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American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

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Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#501

Post by wheelinsupial »

II2II wrote: post #463
b112 wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe your province isn't too bad yet, but these things tend to spread: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/vancouver-sc... With no advanced/honours tract, you have two choices. Subjects too difficult for a large portion of the class, or everyone gets education tailored to the least capable students. Clearly, they aren't removing advanced classes, then suddenly failing 1/2 the class...

The article also mentions that AP (and, presumably, IB) are being maintained. These programs provide a recognized curriculum and the courses are typically taken by students who want advanced classes. I also took a quick glance at the BC mathematics curriculum, which is typically offered in different tiers, and it is offered in different tiers. Science appears to take the usual tact of a general course, with specialis…

> AP (and, presumably, IB) are being maintained

These are not accessible to all students.

It depends on which catchment zone you live in, and even the schools that offer AP don't offer the same AP courses. Last I checked one offered 2 AP courses and another offered 11, so there is huge variance between the schools offering AP. These are public schools, not private schools. There are private schools that also offer AP and IB. The IB private schools cost as much in tuition for one year of high school (IB senior years is a two year program) as a Canadian university does for the 4 year degree. Some of these private schools will teach second or third year university courses to advanced high school students.

The BC math courses are offered at different levels, but even the top level math is not for students who want to move ahead or be challenged. The top level math is the bare minimum to get into a Canadian university. Some schools offer calculus 12 and many other schools don't offer it at all. I guess that's "honors" math.

The "honors" math program that has been eliminated is a program that condensed the regular curriculum. I am so confused as to how that is inequitable, but AP (which has exam costs) and IB are allowed to stay.

In some Surrey schools there are programs to allow students to spend their last year doing a trades foundation program. This isn't evenly distributed either, but is a great way to allow students to start their careers. My brothers are both in the trades, but their friends at other schools spent grade 12 in a foundation program and saved 6k in tuition.

There is even a possibility to take summer courses and spend some of your last year taking college courses or university courses in the right districts. This is for Vancouver and Burnaby students that are close to UBC and SFU, but this isn't advertised or evenly available.

My point and rant about these is that it'll be a matter of time before all of these opportunities are also taken away. If they stay, I'll be pleasantly surprised and gladly admit I'm wrong.

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#502

Post by dan-robertson »

andi999 wrote: post #100
credit_guy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sample problem for K-1 [1]: "Jane fills a bag with three types of chips. There are 3-point, 4-point and 7- point chips. Jane picks 3 chips worth 15 points. Which chips did she pick?" Sample problem for grades 5-6 [2]: "Pinocchio drank half a cup of black coffee. He then filled the cup back up with milk and drank one third of the mixture. Again he filled the cup to the top with milk, drank one sixth of the mixture and…

I don't like the second question. Probably the kid is supposed to see the 'trick' :he drank a full cup of coffee since he didn't refill coffee and drank all. He added 1/2, 1/3 and 1/6 of a cup of milk and drank it all, so (3+2+1)/6=1. He drank the same amount of coffee and milk. I think it is ok as a brain teaser, but there will probably be one kid in the class to see it and all the other kids feel dumb or whatever.…

Without the trick you get:

  Coffee concentration before first,second,third,fourth drinking = 1,x,y,z
  x = 1/2
  y = x*2/3 + 0*1/3 = 1/3
  z = y*5/6 + 0*1/6 = 5/18
  
  Coffee drunk = 1/2 + 1/3 x + 1/6 y + z
    = 1/2 + 1/6 + 1/18 + 5/18
    = 3/6 + 1/6 +     2/6
    = 1
  Milk drunk = 0 + 1/3(1-x) + 1/6(1-y) + (1-z)
    = 1/6 + 2/18 + 13/18
    = 1/6 +     5/6
    = 1
Which is a bit fiddly but hardly impossible. I think there is pedagogical value in doing the algebra accurately and I think it is annoying enough that the trick seems useful and memorable when it is pointed out. The trick is also quite broadly applicable to physics problems where there is conservation of some quantity.

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#503

Post by qweqwweqwe-90i »

rejectedandsad wrote: post #50
google234123 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very funny, no one will resent you as a "leech on society due to" your “inferior mathematical ability.” However, if you actually choose to literally leech on society (e.g. choose to be unemployed and uneducated) then people will. Anyway, education exists to educate. If you care about social welfare, talk to the social welfare programs.

They absolutely do - they most likely consider people like me to be subhuman entities. It’s not like I have the mental ability to get into the fancy schools or fancy companies they got into.

I doubt "these people" (whoever they are) spend 1 second a month thinking about you.

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#504

Post by wheelinsupial »

__turbobrew__ wrote: post #377
b112 wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe your province isn't too bad yet, but these things tend to spread: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/vancouver-sc... With no advanced/honours tract, you have two choices. Subjects too difficult for a large portion of the class, or everyone gets education tailored to the least capable students. Clearly, they aren't removing advanced classes, then suddenly failing 1/2 the class...

As someone thinking of raising kids in Vancouver I was really disappointed by the honours stream being removed from VSB curriculum. If the school board truly wanted equality for their students they should be looking at external factors of why kids are not performing: do they have a place at home to complete homework? Do their parents value education? Do they believe in themselves? I do believe that there is a natural…

You can have your kids take summer courses to finish the regular curriculum early. In some cases they can then be allowed to start taking courses at UBC or SFU. It was mentioned in my Surrey school over a decade ago that there were kids in Vancouver and Burnaby doing that. I think it's a nominal fee to register in the courses while in high school. Something to explore if you're still looking at Vancouver.

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#505

Post by primitivesuave »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #458
dharmab wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because in practice, that causes students to disengage from the learning process: > If we just tell that student their way is the wrong way, we risk turning them off to math for life. I certainly disengaged from some subjects in school due to frustration with "thou shalt" methods of teaching. I was even removed from an upper level English language class because I didn't draw the same conclusions as the teacher from t…

I agree if they told you >23 x 7 is split into ((10 * 7) * 2) + (3 * 7) was the wrong way, then that is harmful. But if the purpose of the test was to see if you can do long multiplication, and you were not able to do it because you did not want to or like to do it that way, then that is a personal problem. The reality is that school (non university level schooling) is not purely about education or exploring the 18 m…

Additionally, mathematics uses standard notation and uniform rigorous standards for what is/isn't true. There is certainly some utility in teaching mental arithmetic skills, but the higher-level concepts are only accessible if one can formulate ideas in accordance with the rest of the body of research.

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#506

Post by sologoub »

zeku wrote: post #392
sologoub wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s very insightful - when I switched to US high school, the approach to math was baffling - everyone had programmable graphing calculators, whereas I wasn’t allowed any calculator at all, and took a lot longer to solve the most basic problems. Most questions were answered by the teacher as “it’s a formula, you follow it and memorize it” (which sounded ridiculous to me for the exact reasons above - I was taught to…

Thankfully for me, my college Calculus professor(in USA) banned calculators for Calc 1 and 2(the two required Calc classes for a computer science degree at my public university). He was heavily avoided by many and "special" for doing so. I found it easier to forego the calculator as it allowed us to focus on methods and how/why over just moving large numbers around.

That sounds pretty awesome actually! It also probably makes it a bit harder to prepare the materials, since you need to make sure it’s reasonably computable by hand.

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#507

Post by rcxdude »

confidantlake wrote: post #248
rcxdude wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main issue is the curriculum and exams emphasize this kind of rote learning (across the board, not just in maths: one stupid reason for this is many of the markers for the exams don't actually have any qualifications in the subject they're marking and need to be able to just pattern-match off a mark sheet). And because teachers and schools are judged so heavily on exam results, they are not just incentivised but…

Ah that is lame that you had to go through that. I remember in my calc class the teacher said we would spend no time learning for the government standardized test. If you can't already pass it you have no business being in the class.

Yeah, with different tests it may be different. But in the UK the government pushes for 'more challenging tests', which means more stuff to memorise, a lot of the stuff is very specific (in science GCSE and A-levels there's specific phrases you need to use to get marks. Accurate descriptions which don't include those key phrases don't get marks), and there's a lot riding on getting near perfect marks. Someone who has a good memory and a few months to prepare and an expert on the topic with years of experience (but no specific preparation) have about the same chance with these exams.

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#508

Post by rejectedandsad »

qweqwweqwe-90i wrote: post #503
rejectedandsad wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They absolutely do - they most likely consider people like me to be subhuman entities. It’s not like I have the mental ability to get into the fancy schools or fancy companies they got into.

I doubt "these people" (whoever they are) spend 1 second a month thinking about you.

Of course not. They’re wealthy enough to not have to think about the “help”, or dregs of society. People like me don’t have that luxury so we?

Re: American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)

#510

Post by II2II »

wheelinsupial wrote: post #501
II2II wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article also mentions that AP (and, presumably, IB) are being maintained. These programs provide a recognized curriculum and the courses are typically taken by students who want advanced classes. I also took a quick glance at the BC mathematics curriculum, which is typically offered in different tiers, and it is offered in different tiers. Science appears to take the usual tact of a general course, with specialis…

> AP (and, presumably, IB) are being maintained These are not accessible to all students. It depends on which catchment zone you live in, and even the schools that offer AP don't offer the same AP courses. Last I checked one offered 2 AP courses and another offered 11, so there is huge variance between the schools offering AP. These are public schools, not private schools. There are private schools that also offer AP…

> It depends on which catchment zone you live in, and even the schools that offer AP don't offer the same AP courses.

I grew up in Calgary. It was possible to apply to special programs outside of your catchment area, with a choice of multiple schools for some programs. Being admitted into a public IB program comes with the expense of a monthly bus pass, not the equivalent of several years of university tuition. I would be surprised if Vancouver is any different since out-of-area students are often the means of maintaining high enough enrolment to offer special programs ranging from academics to the trades.

Something that may have been a quirk of my home city: catchment area was not a hard-and-fast rule for middle school either. There were special programs one could apply to and, failing that, approaching the school's administration directly. Granted, for something like that the family must care enough to take the initiative. That may be in short supply in some areas, but it is by no means a measure of affluence.

> My point and rant about these is that it'll be a matter of time before all of these opportunities are also taken away. If they stay, I'll be pleasantly surprised and gladly admit I'm wrong.

There is also the possibility that you'll see the opportunities taken away, then be pleasantly surprised to see them return. The education system seems to go in cycles, based upon whatever the pedagogical fashions of the day are. Then again, I doubt that we will ever see the extreme of everything being taken away. People seem to like talking about things in extremes that don't truly exist.

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