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Yes, measuring is a more advanced concept than counting as it introduces fractions. I don't think simple measuring would include negative numbers though as that would include a measuring direction concept (i.e. vectors) as rulers don't have negative numbers on them and you can't have a speed of -5kph.
you can measure -5°c though
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Does that mean that a point is also a line as a point has no breadth
No because a line does have a length. In Elements a point is dimension-less.
It seems to me after the lessons, more students are in the "because you said so" camp whereas before the lesson they have more reasoning. I wonder, as parent, how much "indoctrination" and how much "reasoning" shall we impart to our children.
I don't disagree with how zero is used but the english language is the debate here not math. Zero is a legitimate concept in math, if a term describes certain things then is the concept of the lack of those things by default considered a member of those things? Sounds like a linguistic convention in part.
Why not have a separate term to describe zero and infinity as part of the same set, "anumerics"?
I was genuinely impressed how good the "before" answers were. Many adults refuse to accept that they don't know something and will rather invent a fictitious answer, start believing in it and proclaim it as fact - but many of these kindergarteners actually said "I don't know". Stunning emotional maturity! Also, the ones who answered yes or no were mostly able to craft arguments supporting their position. I didn't kno…
At that age, isn't not knowing the default, and experienced many times every day? I wonder when we swap to assuming we know or can deduce everything.
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Personally, I think exams are a horrible way to determine what people have actually understood. Most school exams are just looking for specific "magic" words that are learnt by rote. Questions might be set up to ask why water appears on the outside of a cold glass and the answer would be considered correct if the answer used the word "condensation" without needing any concept of humidity.
I believe this is an issue of how exams are done. There are certainly exams I've written, in Math, in English, in Philosophy, that tested my understanding, and there are certainly some that didnt.
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Yeah, but that's just an artefact of that particular scale. You'd have trouble measuring -5K
you can measure negative pressure, negative acceleration
Negative acceleration has a directional component, so again, it's like a negative velocity and is a vector.
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My wife is a primary school teacher and I assure you, UK kids are taught terminologies. I don’t think they were when I was a kid but curriculums change.
It is taught in primary school, yeah. I remember learning pseudo terminology like "do-words" for "verbs" in first and second grade. Pre-school they try to teach "reading" letters nowadays, but then they get drilled in that "A is for apple" and now the shape A could mean the sound apple, and they have even less of a clue on what letters are. (Even though in the 90s research already pointed out that reading should be t…
My wife is a primary school teacher, a few of my friends are teachers, and I have two kids in primary school. So this is a topic I’m very familiar with.
What people forget is that the curriculum changes. It changes frequently. When I was at school the curriculum was very different to what it is like now. For example I actually learned the term “digraph” from my kids, not my own schooling. I mean, I always knew what digraphs and split digraphs were, but I never knew they were called digraphs.