My kids are but little, and I'm a novice in this child-rearing and educating business. And a business it is indeed. A friend of mine is a math and science teacher, and she was explaining the way that new math works.
It involves a lot of steps. A lot more than we were used to. And the way in which points are allocated on tests these days is you accumulate them. By making the steps explicit and correct. So you get something for correct method, but not everything if the answer is incorrect. Helps the sloppy and careless who 'nearly' get it right.
On the other hand, the brilliant, who just 'see' the answer, will only get partial marks for the correct answer, due to the fact that the machinations of their brilliance are either not explicit, nor made explicit, nor made explicit in the way that is acceptable to the teacher of the marker.
My colleague brought in her Grade 3 daughter's "Everyday Math" book. Showed me one of these multi-step methods for multiplication - the lattice method. Go ahead, my fellow oldies, see if it makes sense...
Can I guess that you were (1) confused, (2) puzzled (3) worked it out (4) slightly outraged that they'd made something quite simple into something quite complicated (5) defensive of the way that you learnt math and multiplication when you were young?
What problems do I have with Everyday Math.... well, let's start with a dead easy one - I'm prejudiced. It's an American program from the US of A. Now I have no doubt that Chicago, and in fact many other USA institutions have brilliant mathematicians. Leading in their fields. These days many of them Asian. My problem is where the USA is on the tables - like PISA
for Mathematics, they're way way down. When I first said this to someone, they said, "oh, but places like HK have a few brilliant pupils who pull the whole thing up." No siree. These are ranked on 6 levels and show the % of pupils at each level. Hardly something to be proud of as a nation I'd say. Let alone being presumptuous to be exporting your 'method' to the rest of the world... no child left behind? Nope, but plenty at the bottom of the pile.
Let's go to the next problem I have. The partial marking method. What is it good for? Well self-esteem of course. The holy grail of modern education. What is it lousy for? I'll mention just a couple - Apollo 13, the Mars orbiter, and here are a few more disasters.
When you look at maths, there's a lot of blogging going on out there. Here's an interesting one on 'at risk kids' and ways to teach them. Please know, I am not saying that mathematics should be exclusively for the mathematically brilliant. I'm just questioning why we punish brilliance more than carelessness. I'm also wondering if there is merit in rote learning of times tables, addition etc.
What do you think?
Good Service
2 hours ago
7 comments:
I don't know about the lattice method, looks a bit odd to me.
I know that at my kids ESF school, they learn a variety of ways to do addition and subtraction and multiplication. My eldest's teacher in P-4 (when she was 8) said that they want to give kids a variety of strategies and methods to do the basic operations - and then the kids can do the method that is easiest for them. Sounds fair enough to me.
re: rote learning of times tables - they do that too. Every week for the past few weeks all the kids in my youngest's class are given 5 minutes to fill out the tables and once they achieve 100% they then work to bring down the time (e.g. finish in 4min 15 seconds, finish in 3 min 45, etc.).
Overall, I'm not displeased w/ the maths education at my children's schools. My kids are achieving well, and enjoy it. They are on an equal level w/ the kids in the local schools (I know because we have them do a bit of extra work at home w/ workbooks targetting their age group in local schools).
Rote learning not only lessen the time required to finish a question (To finish 100 questions in 2 hours, with all the required steps written down these days, you must be fast...), it can also strengthen the memory power of your child.
The teaching of math have changed alot and it is still changing. I have problems helping the kids with their math these days because multiplication looks nothing like what I have learned in the past. No way I will bother to learn how Lattice works...
Have a look at this wiki page regarding Singapore's Math Method. It will be good to expose your children to other methods and I strongly recommend those from Singapore. It comes highly recommended...
I've heard more comments about the excellence of Singapore's math method. The website wasn't terribly revealing though.
I'm concerned on the maths thing that instead of "no child left behind" it's going to be "every parent left behind"
Winifred, if you're happy with the ESF math - why do you "have them do a bit of extra work at home w/ workbooks targeting their age group in local schools". See my blog /comment today about what kids learn at school vs. at home vs. via tutoring
Hi Gweipo,
I'm basically happy - not thrilled, or thinking it's perfect. My DH is a local guy and *he* thinks that it's good to have the kids do a bit of maths each day, to keep their hand in. I think it doesn't do any harm -especially since the ESF schools have very little formal homework in the primary years. We use the local workbooks (in English) because that's what's available in the bookstores and we agree that if they are keeping up w/ the local level of maths - that's satisfactory.
So, my youngest does a single page of "Baba maths" each day & Baba corrects it.
My older one now doesn't do much Baba maths, because her homework load has increased now that she's in secondary school. Baba sometimes helps her if she has questions or problems w/ her math homework assigned by the school.
I think it may be a cultural thing - my local govt. school in Cambridge Massachusetts was very "progressive" in the 1970s - no homework, we got a "work contract" once a week in 4th grade and later where we had to do a certain amount of work by the end of the week. I usually finished by Tuesday at noon and spent the rest of the time reading books from the school library.
Then my family moved to a different town where the education was more formal and there was regular homework and I learned to diagram sentences and had math homework every day. But still far more casual than education in HK today.
My husband grew up in HK and went through the local system and believes in lots of school work. I think I've posted on Batgung about a book called "The Chinese Learner" that some educational psychologist wrote that argued that in Chinese cultures people believe that academic success is the result of Hard Work, whereas in the USA people believe more in "ability" or "talent".
So, in rearing the kids and dealing w/ their education, we have worked to achieve a happy medium between both styles of education.
I'll go and read your latest posting.
BTW - on Batgung, I'm SKmama
Hi Gweipo,
Hope the blog here will show you more about math in Singapore : math in singapore.
If I am not wrong, textbooks used in Singapore's curriculum usually come in a pair. One for the teacher and one for the students. If you can find the textbook for teachers then you will not be out of touch with what they are learning. I'm sure they will have an instructor edition for the textbooks being used by your kids.
By the way, I have just figured out the lattice method, even though I said I wouldn't be bothered to learn it. I guess like you, I am afraid of being left out...
There are many homeschoolers in the US using Singapore math. I have heard a lot of good about it and many of my homeschooling friends have used it. We've used Math U See with my oldest son because he couldn't understand the math and couldn't learn by rote what he didn't understand (that is condensing two years into one sentence--there are a lot more details). But, had I not needed the visual manipulatives inherent in Math U See, I would have used Singapore math. (in one school year, he learned addition, subtraction, and multiplication, all because he could now understand what he was supposed to be learning--and yes, he does know his multiplication by rote and we test him on this once in a while just to be sure--but this was not until he understood what it all meant)
My youngest has used several different maths, ending with a more local textbook (like Winifred talks about). We are more casual about their schooling but want them to be at the same level as the local students--so far, so good.
M
Hi Gweipo! It's Cheryl van Tilburg, an expat mom living in Singapore. My kids attend an American school that uses Everyday Math, so we supplement with Singapore Math.
Everyday Math's weaknesses go far beyond the crazy lattice multiplication procedure. It's a spiraling curriculum that introduces students to many topics each year, but never requires kids to master math skills before moving on. ("They'll come back to it next year," you'll hear over and over.)
It also tries to cover WAY too much, so that kids are left wondering "what just happened."
The National Math Advisory Panel just issued a report on mathematics education in the US, calling the system "broken." Some of the reasons: spiraling and too-broad curriculum -- the hallmarks of Everyday Math. (This report is a must-read for parents who wonder what's happening in math education:
http://www.ed.gov/about/bdscomm/list/mathpanel/report/final-report.pdf
And for students who struggle in reading, Everyday Math is a nightmare -- it requires strong reading skills. Kids who are good at math, but weak with words, suffer under Everyday Math.
The Texas State Board of Education voted recently to cut Everyday Math's 3rd-grade text from its list of approved curriculum because it didn't prepare students for higher math.
Singapore Math, on the other hand, is really worth a look. SingaporeMath.com is a good place to start (check out the placement test page for assessments you can print out and try on your kids...very eye-opening). And several school districts in the US have begun using Singapore Math in K-5.
Sorry for the long comment, but you've hit a hot button. Most parents don't realize their kids have gaps because of Everyday Math until it's too late. The time to act is when they're young!
Good luck.
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