Ask a student "why school is important?" and you will get a lot of different answers. If you think deeply some of them they could lead you to a worldview-shattering realization about what students perceptions of the world are. I urge teachers to ask students this question 1-on-1.
Students almost always say the reason school is important is "to get a good job and/or make more money or go to a good college" Ask the same student how school will help them to do those things and most will have little in the way of a descriptive answer. You might hear "by getting good grades" or a vague "by learning" answer. Rarely a student will answer that "learning allows you to do more things that's why school is important." If you ask that same student why learning is important and they will most likely say "to get a good job or go to a good college." Its all very circular and a more vacuous than we teachers realize. Do students realize that the learning is why you are capable to "do" college and "do" a job or is their concept simply a progression that happens and your done when you are not smart enough to do more: Elementary leads to Middle leads to High school leads to College leads to Good job? If the latter is their mindset and the transitions we offer students from primary to high school are basically social promotion (they are), why would them actually making effort to learn enter into that equation? What message do we send kids when the importance of learning is something teachers talk about but the reality is such that practically everyone who brings a pencil graduates into the next level of school. If students believe that their intelligence is a constant (not growing or dynamic in any way) isn't it a matter of them just passively sitting by and seeing how far their smarts will allow them to make it in school?
The funny thing is that a lot of us would have said the same things I hear students say today. Like them, we didn't think much about what our answers meant in real life for us either. If a teacher asked me why is school important, I would have just parroted what adults told me school was for. My goal in answering would have been to get the question "correct" to make the teacher happy with me. Other students have told me that they would parrot the correct answer just to "get the teacher off my back". In other words to avoid the potential personal criticism a teacher may give them for their own personal understandings and goals, students will tell the teacher what they want to hear. As well meaning teachers, we would want to help the child align their thoughts and goals correctly. Students often tell us what we want to hear to avoid frustrations like looking ignorant, being criticized , etc. It's something experienced teachers are always mindful of. I didn't think to analyze the students answers when I first started asking this question. I felt students were on the right track when they said "to go to a good college and have a good job". I was wrong because I didn't dig deep enough!
So here is the million dollar question for readers: "Based on what you have personally heard from kids do they have an understanding of the purpose of school and learning?"
From my experience I would say no. The purpose of learning is to gather knowledge and apply it to acquire skills that extend your ability to do things.
Language is a tricky thing. I can see why some people might say "the purpose of high school is to learn so you can go to college." The sentence makes sense, but think about how that language could be interpreted by literal minded students. Some students may even read into this sentence and see cause and effect. "The purpose of high school is... to go to college."
Language is a larger factor than most give it credit for in this misunderstanding. Look at a lot of ways we talk about education in the context of learning. For example, compare the following sentences that convey the purpose of education.
"High school is important so you can go to college and get a degree. Then you can get hired at good job doing what you want and have a successful life."
"High school is important because what you choose to learn and do there helps you develop skills that allow you to 'do' college. You can choose to learn advanced skills in college that make it easier for you find a job you like and live a successful life."
Look at how weak the language we use is in the first sentence. you "go to" college you "get" a degree you "have" a successful life. The way this is worded these things seem to happen to you as if you have no control over your life. Isn't this is the reactive I'm-a-victim thinking we so often complain about in our students? Compare that to the language in the second phrase. Its a bit wordy, complex, and maybe not very poetic (I welcome suggestions) but it is reality. We choose what we learn. College is not just some place you go like the mall it is something you do and work at. We learn to get skills. Having knowledge means having skills that can lead you to live a successful life. Sadly, many students don't see it that way and the language we are using isn't helping.
Let's teach our kids why learning is important! (Send me any ideas that are successful, I welcome them) Here is a mini-lesson to try with any kid or group of kids. The final point of this mini-lesson for students is to get students discussing the connections between learning, skills and boredom; The more you know, the more fun life can be.
Ask them...
1) "Do you get bored easily?"
2) "Do you think that doing nothing or not being able to do anything is boring?"
3) "Do you like being bored?" (younger audiences)
4) "Is playing your favorite game boring?"
5) "Would it be fun to play a new game if you didn't know any of the rules?"
6) "How would you know if the new game was really fun or not?"
Give them time to think about each question seperately as needed especially number 6. To know if the game is really fun we would have to learn about the game by reading the rules, watching others play, or playing it yourself. A good follow up question might be "Is watching others play, reading directions, and playing a new game learning?" Its only though learning that we can know if things are fun. We could miss a lot of really fun games out there if we don't learn much about them to see if they are any fun.
Doing nothing is boring.
You can't do what you haven't learned.
You CAN'T imagine the fun you could be having if you knew more!
Friday, March 26, 2010
Friday, March 5, 2010
The myth of "the basics"
What's WRONG with math education?
Before I talk about why I want to define what I mean by the phrase "doing mathematics". Stephen Wolfram defines doing mathematics as a 4 step process ad I agree with him. Doing mathematics is...
1) Finding a problem in the real world.
2) translating the real world elements into the language of math using formulas and symbols.
3) Computing the answer.
4) Reinterpreting the answer's value back into the real world to help solve the problem.
I think we have lost sight of what mathematics is all about. We now have machines to free us from the drudgery of step 3. We no longer have to fixate on it as we did in the past. In the days of pencil and paper it was extremely important to focus on step 3. There were no machines to do step 3 and it was very difficult to compute answers. Procedures were made and proven to allow mankind to extend his ability to compute ever more difficult mathematics. Some Mathematicians have built their careers almost exclusively on creating and proving abstract computational procedures for step 3.
Mathematics has developed and grown as a field because it solves problems in the real world, and computing is just a part of that process. From here I will be talking about what I observe in the classroom and how it compares with "doing mathematics". I will also analyze some of the arguments used to perpetuate and justify the status-quo of mathematics: procedural step 3 thinking and technological obsolescence of content.
I want to point out that what I am advocating is that we switch how we handle and do step 3. Instead of using paper and pencil, we use computers to do the computing work. Every other step in doing mathematics will remain the same. That may mean instead of making the assignments like "solve for x" we ask questions with higher cognitive demand like "write a real world story problem that uses the equation below and a person would need to find x". The difference here is that to answer the second question, you really have to know what the symbols of math mean. Students often limp their way though the procedures of math by memorizing processes without attaching meaning to the procedure. A student may memorize the procedure of finding an average as "add all the numbers together then divide by how many numbers there are." That's great, but what good is it if they don't know that the average is the exact center or balancing point of a set of numbers? Faking math by memorizing a bunch of steps superficially is common crutch for students. Asking questions like the second one above ensure that the purpose and concept behind a math idea is learned because in order to answer the question you need to understand math, not just be good at memorization.
"What if the computer is wrong? How would anyone know?" is another excuse that is often given for the "reason" we need to do things by hand. This is a silly argument when you think about it. Why stop at computers? How can we trust your own hand calculations? How can we trust mathematicians? How can you trust the internet? How can you trust your eyes, you could be delusional couldn't you? You can be forever agnostic about everything if you want. The fact is, its easy to point to a time when computers failed while ignoring that they are thousands of times more accurate and faster than humans at the same computational tasks. If some person can find an error with Mathematica, does that mean all computers everywhere are dangerous and will destroy math? It doesn't seem to be true of hand algorithms. When we get those wrong we acknowledge it was a mistake and correct it. We don't abandon hand algorithms and move back to stones and abacuses for counting, so why would computers be any different?
"What if everyone just trusted computers all the time? That's dangerous to trust computers to such a high degree all the time. If we don't teach our students how to do things by hand how will they verify the accuracy of computers? People won't be able to think!" You might think I am crazy, but I have heard this argument more than once so I will address it. Forgive my sarcasm but in society we have books, a primitive form of data storage. Should all of the world fall into the chaos that will "surely" follow by trusting a computer to solve for X and it failing to do so, people could read these books. Some people even learn things like math by reading books alone. In fact, I think some people will want to learn the hand algorithms because they find them interesting.(Wouldn't teaching that class would be a math teacher's dream!?!) Unless all math books are destroyed these hand algorithms will not be lost.
I think its questions and lines of reasoning like the last one that really tell it like it is. People do not know the difference between knowledge that everyone should know and knowledge that only a few people need to know. The current math procedures could be taught in a math history class where the inventive and ingenious people who developed them would get the honor in history they have earned. Now most of their names are hardly mentioned because we are to busy drilling everyone on ALL the algorithms.
"The basics" in math is this undefined hazy ideal that seems to impede progress in math education. No one would EVER put up with in a class that was not so abstract. What would you say if you wanted to take a class to basic computer class and on the first day the teacher gave you some computer chips a soldering iron and began teaching circuit dynamics? In the afternoon you were taught binary and machine code. You wanted to learn how to use Microsoft Windows, but when you tell the teacher this he teacher assures you that in order to REALLY understand Windows you must first master machine code and later MS DOS, then you might be ready to learn Windows NT then Windows 2000, then Windows Vista, then Windows 7, but only if you get your doctorate. Would you pursue such a program or would you look at all the people you know, realize that none of them know machine code but still know enough about computers to use them and then drop out? This is currently what happens in mathematics education. Is it any wonder why our students don't want to learn math? THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE! No one would take a computer class like the one above unless it was a special course in computing history. So long as that was the only program available, those that did would probably make a lot of money, but their success wouldn't be because machine code was the bedrock of the industry or gave them new insight into programming. It would be because few people would have the patience to deal with that kind of program. Fewer people in the program means higher demand for qualified people and thus higher wages, but students learning of machine code and soldering could have been better spend on other more important concepts like object oriented programming, system design, program architecture, etc.
If this program were like math education today students would complete their mostly irrelevant coursework, the professors would see that the few students who completed the program were successful and confirm their beliefs about just how important it was for students to know "the basics" of computer design. Even a few of the students who liked their machine code classes would extol how useful it was that they learned the basics. Since their were no other programs out there that didn't obsess over the basics, there would be no way to tell just how useful the basics really were in creating competent computer operators. If no another program was skipping the basics to teach more useful and practical information would we assume that there was no other way to teach it as we currently do in mathematics education today? Is it really necessary to get good with a soldering iron and circuit boards for you to use a computer? Is this knowledge everyone needs to know or some people need to know?
So why all the confusion? Why is it that math never seems to move forward?
What's wrong with mathematics education is simple: everyone is totally obsessed and hung up on step 3. Since step 3 is taught almost exclusively in the classroom from day 1, often the people who get into math fall in love the the procedural elegance and exact nature of the subject. Even though we now have computers to to the drudgery of calculation, they still extol computation by hand as some kind of virtue, while ignoring the actual application of math to the real world by glossing over steps 1, 2, and 4. Simply put we have not moved math into the age of computers; We must teach all 4 steps of mathematics in balance. Bringing math into the computer age will also make math accessible to the general population, democratizing math and opening exciting possibilities. No longer would mathematical analysis be restricted to the few who learned hand procedures. Anyone who had an understanding of math terminology and relationships could analyze data or use data to make decisions.
The age of computers has made hand calculation obsolete. If you don't believe me go to wolframalpha.com and punch in an equation try "3x+2=8" Magic. Check out the introduction video here.
http://www.wolframalpha.com/screencast/introducingwolframalpha.html
It is amazing what will happen in the future! We could be awestruck by its possibilities or fearful what will math teachers do when free websites like Wolframalpha are available to them 24/7 on smartphones. In 10 years, most US citizens will have a smartphone, are we going to force more algorithms down the throats of people who don't want to learn them or will we strengthen the rigor of our math curricula and make mathematics accessible to people who don't have the patience to learn the computational end of math but thrive on steps 1, 2, and 4. Which is better for the economy: fear and no change or change and possibility?
Math is one of those subjects that people think does not change over time. I would agree that the theoretical foundations of math have not and may never change, but how we teach math, how we learn math, where math is applied, and technology are factors that do change the game of math education. Fortunately, technology has long changed the game for mathematics for scientists and engineers, but it has not for students. Technological advances are being made at an exponential rate and we need more mathematically competent people to operate and understand these complex machines.
Are we producing people fluent in the concepts of math? The answer is a resounding NO! From my experience, most people have no concept of math beyond it is working with numbers or doing problems like "solve for x", "simplify the expression" or "rationalize the denominator". You would think these procedures were all made of gold and absolutely necessary to understand math the way some math teachers and professors talk about them. "They need to know the basics" is appealing rhetoric, but are students able to do the basics?
A simple look at the NAEP, TIMMS or PISA (international math and reasoning tests) we see US students' scores doubled by their rivals in other countries. It's pretty obvious students are not getting the basics (or much else) out of math classrooms today. I don't think foreign born students are twice as smart as us or that some sort of genetic advantage evolved in the last 100 years. There is nothing wrong with the American student!!!! They have every right to be bored to tears with hand algorithms they are forced to learn in exchange for a letter on a sheet of paper. (A,B,C,D,F) Especially after they have been shown that a computer can do it in a second. Nothing highlights our dismal failure to advance math curricula forward like the poor scores we see in the US today.
The students we do produce are can barely compute all the rigorous procedures and algorithms we teach them at all much less explain why and where we would apply those procedures. Basically, we cram computation down their throats, claim is important to know, and punish them when they choke on it. We busily teach them that doing math like solving equations by hand is very important, but then after we spend hours and days in the classroom teaching them these pencil and paper procedures, we then show them how it can be done on a calculator in 20 seconds. After all that, its more than unfair to be expected to be taken seriously by students who rely on technology everyday. Shouldn't technology make these manual calculation units easier and shorter? Shouldn't the questions we pose to students be becoming more conceptual and real-world based as technology frees them from the drudgery of manual calculation? According to most mathematics educators today, the answer is no.
I will end with some good news. We may be behind as a country, but no one is where they need to be in this math debacle. Other countries are busy teaching their students the same "by hand" procedures as we are. Some like Japan do not allow calculators, and I have even seen Japanese students wasting hours working abacuses with lightning speed and precision. (apparently while calculators are cheating abacuses are not)
Why do other countries seem to destroy us in math? Its a good question that demands an answer. This could be a thesis, but I will briefly discuss some of the reasons. Most countries scores benefit from the educational systems they have in place that test students after elementary school and then place children in different educational "tracks". Often only the students who are on an academic track take the tests for the country. Students who are on a good track and like mathematics do not have to contend with the poor behavior of students who don't want to be there. This is a huge advantage. Another factor I feel is not often discussed is why Asian countries do so well on tests is language. Many Asian countries have languages that are made up of thousands of symbols. The order of symbols and their placement in relation to each other acts a lot like an algorithm to change word meaning. Math symbolism may come easier to them because many of the learning techniques they use in language (memorization and word order) happen to be useful in math symbolic manipulation.
Another reason for the decline of education in the US is the abundance of supplies Americans have. Most poor families in the US still own a TV, have enough to eat and drink, and have access to shelter. To them physical survival is not really the issue.
In other countries the poor have much less. It is obvious that education creates opportunity to move up in social standing. People who are rich are educated, and vis-versa. To our uneducated and media brainwashed youth, learning seems a lot less appealing then waiting for your big chance and making it big. Their ignorance of probability aside, it is a matter of values. Whenever our youth have the good life already they take it for granted and don't look at the factors that may have bought their family to their current status. In China the children of the middle class are already refusing to work in school. In Japan there is the increasing problem of Japanese youth not learning the full Japanese language. In Japan this language is what all academic books are written in!
Teachers keep hope, math education in the world is not much better than in the US. We now have a choice: will we move forward by using technology in place of hand algorithms, or will we forbid it until students can do everything by hand? Will we move forward or backward?
Before I talk about why I want to define what I mean by the phrase "doing mathematics". Stephen Wolfram defines doing mathematics as a 4 step process ad I agree with him. Doing mathematics is...
1) Finding a problem in the real world.
2) translating the real world elements into the language of math using formulas and symbols.
3) Computing the answer.
4) Reinterpreting the answer's value back into the real world to help solve the problem.
I think we have lost sight of what mathematics is all about. We now have machines to free us from the drudgery of step 3. We no longer have to fixate on it as we did in the past. In the days of pencil and paper it was extremely important to focus on step 3. There were no machines to do step 3 and it was very difficult to compute answers. Procedures were made and proven to allow mankind to extend his ability to compute ever more difficult mathematics. Some Mathematicians have built their careers almost exclusively on creating and proving abstract computational procedures for step 3.
Mathematics has developed and grown as a field because it solves problems in the real world, and computing is just a part of that process. From here I will be talking about what I observe in the classroom and how it compares with "doing mathematics". I will also analyze some of the arguments used to perpetuate and justify the status-quo of mathematics: procedural step 3 thinking and technological obsolescence of content.
I want to point out that what I am advocating is that we switch how we handle and do step 3. Instead of using paper and pencil, we use computers to do the computing work. Every other step in doing mathematics will remain the same. That may mean instead of making the assignments like "solve for x" we ask questions with higher cognitive demand like "write a real world story problem that uses the equation below and a person would need to find x". The difference here is that to answer the second question, you really have to know what the symbols of math mean. Students often limp their way though the procedures of math by memorizing processes without attaching meaning to the procedure. A student may memorize the procedure of finding an average as "add all the numbers together then divide by how many numbers there are." That's great, but what good is it if they don't know that the average is the exact center or balancing point of a set of numbers? Faking math by memorizing a bunch of steps superficially is common crutch for students. Asking questions like the second one above ensure that the purpose and concept behind a math idea is learned because in order to answer the question you need to understand math, not just be good at memorization.
"What if the computer is wrong? How would anyone know?" is another excuse that is often given for the "reason" we need to do things by hand. This is a silly argument when you think about it. Why stop at computers? How can we trust your own hand calculations? How can we trust mathematicians? How can you trust the internet? How can you trust your eyes, you could be delusional couldn't you? You can be forever agnostic about everything if you want. The fact is, its easy to point to a time when computers failed while ignoring that they are thousands of times more accurate and faster than humans at the same computational tasks. If some person can find an error with Mathematica, does that mean all computers everywhere are dangerous and will destroy math? It doesn't seem to be true of hand algorithms. When we get those wrong we acknowledge it was a mistake and correct it. We don't abandon hand algorithms and move back to stones and abacuses for counting, so why would computers be any different?
"What if everyone just trusted computers all the time? That's dangerous to trust computers to such a high degree all the time. If we don't teach our students how to do things by hand how will they verify the accuracy of computers? People won't be able to think!" You might think I am crazy, but I have heard this argument more than once so I will address it. Forgive my sarcasm but in society we have books, a primitive form of data storage. Should all of the world fall into the chaos that will "surely" follow by trusting a computer to solve for X and it failing to do so, people could read these books. Some people even learn things like math by reading books alone. In fact, I think some people will want to learn the hand algorithms because they find them interesting.(Wouldn't teaching that class would be a math teacher's dream!?!) Unless all math books are destroyed these hand algorithms will not be lost.
I think its questions and lines of reasoning like the last one that really tell it like it is. People do not know the difference between knowledge that everyone should know and knowledge that only a few people need to know. The current math procedures could be taught in a math history class where the inventive and ingenious people who developed them would get the honor in history they have earned. Now most of their names are hardly mentioned because we are to busy drilling everyone on ALL the algorithms.
"The basics" in math is this undefined hazy ideal that seems to impede progress in math education. No one would EVER put up with in a class that was not so abstract. What would you say if you wanted to take a class to basic computer class and on the first day the teacher gave you some computer chips a soldering iron and began teaching circuit dynamics? In the afternoon you were taught binary and machine code. You wanted to learn how to use Microsoft Windows, but when you tell the teacher this he teacher assures you that in order to REALLY understand Windows you must first master machine code and later MS DOS, then you might be ready to learn Windows NT then Windows 2000, then Windows Vista, then Windows 7, but only if you get your doctorate. Would you pursue such a program or would you look at all the people you know, realize that none of them know machine code but still know enough about computers to use them and then drop out? This is currently what happens in mathematics education. Is it any wonder why our students don't want to learn math? THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE! No one would take a computer class like the one above unless it was a special course in computing history. So long as that was the only program available, those that did would probably make a lot of money, but their success wouldn't be because machine code was the bedrock of the industry or gave them new insight into programming. It would be because few people would have the patience to deal with that kind of program. Fewer people in the program means higher demand for qualified people and thus higher wages, but students learning of machine code and soldering could have been better spend on other more important concepts like object oriented programming, system design, program architecture, etc.
If this program were like math education today students would complete their mostly irrelevant coursework, the professors would see that the few students who completed the program were successful and confirm their beliefs about just how important it was for students to know "the basics" of computer design. Even a few of the students who liked their machine code classes would extol how useful it was that they learned the basics. Since their were no other programs out there that didn't obsess over the basics, there would be no way to tell just how useful the basics really were in creating competent computer operators. If no another program was skipping the basics to teach more useful and practical information would we assume that there was no other way to teach it as we currently do in mathematics education today? Is it really necessary to get good with a soldering iron and circuit boards for you to use a computer? Is this knowledge everyone needs to know or some people need to know?
So why all the confusion? Why is it that math never seems to move forward?
What's wrong with mathematics education is simple: everyone is totally obsessed and hung up on step 3. Since step 3 is taught almost exclusively in the classroom from day 1, often the people who get into math fall in love the the procedural elegance and exact nature of the subject. Even though we now have computers to to the drudgery of calculation, they still extol computation by hand as some kind of virtue, while ignoring the actual application of math to the real world by glossing over steps 1, 2, and 4. Simply put we have not moved math into the age of computers; We must teach all 4 steps of mathematics in balance. Bringing math into the computer age will also make math accessible to the general population, democratizing math and opening exciting possibilities. No longer would mathematical analysis be restricted to the few who learned hand procedures. Anyone who had an understanding of math terminology and relationships could analyze data or use data to make decisions.
The age of computers has made hand calculation obsolete. If you don't believe me go to wolframalpha.com and punch in an equation try "3x+2=8" Magic. Check out the introduction video here.
http://www.wolframalpha.com/screencast/introducingwolframalpha.html
It is amazing what will happen in the future! We could be awestruck by its possibilities or fearful what will math teachers do when free websites like Wolframalpha are available to them 24/7 on smartphones. In 10 years, most US citizens will have a smartphone, are we going to force more algorithms down the throats of people who don't want to learn them or will we strengthen the rigor of our math curricula and make mathematics accessible to people who don't have the patience to learn the computational end of math but thrive on steps 1, 2, and 4. Which is better for the economy: fear and no change or change and possibility?
Math is one of those subjects that people think does not change over time. I would agree that the theoretical foundations of math have not and may never change, but how we teach math, how we learn math, where math is applied, and technology are factors that do change the game of math education. Fortunately, technology has long changed the game for mathematics for scientists and engineers, but it has not for students. Technological advances are being made at an exponential rate and we need more mathematically competent people to operate and understand these complex machines.
Are we producing people fluent in the concepts of math? The answer is a resounding NO! From my experience, most people have no concept of math beyond it is working with numbers or doing problems like "solve for x", "simplify the expression" or "rationalize the denominator". You would think these procedures were all made of gold and absolutely necessary to understand math the way some math teachers and professors talk about them. "They need to know the basics" is appealing rhetoric, but are students able to do the basics?
A simple look at the NAEP, TIMMS or PISA (international math and reasoning tests) we see US students' scores doubled by their rivals in other countries. It's pretty obvious students are not getting the basics (or much else) out of math classrooms today. I don't think foreign born students are twice as smart as us or that some sort of genetic advantage evolved in the last 100 years. There is nothing wrong with the American student!!!! They have every right to be bored to tears with hand algorithms they are forced to learn in exchange for a letter on a sheet of paper. (A,B,C,D,F) Especially after they have been shown that a computer can do it in a second. Nothing highlights our dismal failure to advance math curricula forward like the poor scores we see in the US today.
The students we do produce are can barely compute all the rigorous procedures and algorithms we teach them at all much less explain why and where we would apply those procedures. Basically, we cram computation down their throats, claim is important to know, and punish them when they choke on it. We busily teach them that doing math like solving equations by hand is very important, but then after we spend hours and days in the classroom teaching them these pencil and paper procedures, we then show them how it can be done on a calculator in 20 seconds. After all that, its more than unfair to be expected to be taken seriously by students who rely on technology everyday. Shouldn't technology make these manual calculation units easier and shorter? Shouldn't the questions we pose to students be becoming more conceptual and real-world based as technology frees them from the drudgery of manual calculation? According to most mathematics educators today, the answer is no.
I will end with some good news. We may be behind as a country, but no one is where they need to be in this math debacle. Other countries are busy teaching their students the same "by hand" procedures as we are. Some like Japan do not allow calculators, and I have even seen Japanese students wasting hours working abacuses with lightning speed and precision. (apparently while calculators are cheating abacuses are not)
Why do other countries seem to destroy us in math? Its a good question that demands an answer. This could be a thesis, but I will briefly discuss some of the reasons. Most countries scores benefit from the educational systems they have in place that test students after elementary school and then place children in different educational "tracks". Often only the students who are on an academic track take the tests for the country. Students who are on a good track and like mathematics do not have to contend with the poor behavior of students who don't want to be there. This is a huge advantage. Another factor I feel is not often discussed is why Asian countries do so well on tests is language. Many Asian countries have languages that are made up of thousands of symbols. The order of symbols and their placement in relation to each other acts a lot like an algorithm to change word meaning. Math symbolism may come easier to them because many of the learning techniques they use in language (memorization and word order) happen to be useful in math symbolic manipulation.
Another reason for the decline of education in the US is the abundance of supplies Americans have. Most poor families in the US still own a TV, have enough to eat and drink, and have access to shelter. To them physical survival is not really the issue.
In other countries the poor have much less. It is obvious that education creates opportunity to move up in social standing. People who are rich are educated, and vis-versa. To our uneducated and media brainwashed youth, learning seems a lot less appealing then waiting for your big chance and making it big. Their ignorance of probability aside, it is a matter of values. Whenever our youth have the good life already they take it for granted and don't look at the factors that may have bought their family to their current status. In China the children of the middle class are already refusing to work in school. In Japan there is the increasing problem of Japanese youth not learning the full Japanese language. In Japan this language is what all academic books are written in!
Teachers keep hope, math education in the world is not much better than in the US. We now have a choice: will we move forward by using technology in place of hand algorithms, or will we forbid it until students can do everything by hand? Will we move forward or backward?
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Dedication
I am dedicating this blog to all the hardworking teachers out there who work tirelessly to the bone just to get all that is expected of them done, particularly urban teachers. I am especially proud of those who not only get it all done, but still dedicate time to helping students by being innovative and creating meaningful learning experiences for their students. They work long hours for students who do not seem to have any intrinsic motivation at all. They live in frustration as students bash a subject they love but still push though it to teach it anyway; They want their students to learn. Most are forced by policy to teach some particular topic on a particular day like a robot by a district that 'knows best". All too often teachers work in an environment that feeds them disrespect from all sides: student, administrators and parents and punishes them when they choke on it. In some urban areas teachers have to all but beg a student to learn just one fact. (How good it feels to think you may have accomplished something) They are blamed for what others do or fail to do. They are underpaid, overworked and rarely have the support and materials they need. Public education is a sinking ship! To those who stay in it anyway bailing water to help our children, You are heroes!
I have been a math teacher for 7 years. I will likely keep teaching until this June because I lost faith in the systems ability to right itself from the inside. I don't believe anything short of gutting whats there and restructuring the way we all manage from superintendent down to teachers in the classroom will solve the problems our great nation faces. Education is a mess, until I feel like I can be productive as a teacher again I will not return to the profession. There are also other personal factors involved with my choice to leave like starting a family.
Teaching is the hardest job in the world!!! PERIOD!
One fellow at a bar I was visiting said "Teaching is easy! Once you get started you just have to dust off lesson plans and do the same thing every year until your 3 month vacation" People like him have no knowledge of the reality of any classroom. It kind of reminds of when Rush Limbaugh told a caller that the price of his recent doctor visits were less than the cost of an SUV and were perfectly reasonable. Hey Rush, $15,000 is a lot of money to OTHER people.
Attention teacher haters: I have a challenge for you! Name one other job where you are charged to manage a bunch of workers who don't get paid anything, are forced to go to work everyday, can't usually be fired, aren't usually screened before they are hired, and, worst of all, know if they don't work it will be you who is blamed for it. As a manager you can't use tough language or physical force to get them to work. You are also held accountable to at least three entities who often have conflicting interests. (peers, parents, administrators, district policy, state standards, district standards, etc.) In addition, you will have to pay for all of your training and must take college courses to keep your job.
Good luck!
The purpose of this blog is to create awareness of and spread ideas that educators may find insightful and helpful. To this end, most of my posts will be about or connected to at least one of the following ideas.
1) Choice Theory and the Deming management model must used in education.
2) Math must "grow up"! I mean that as a statement of where math is and also as a challenge to professors and others in the field to be aware of technologies ever-changing role in the process of mathematics. Currently we are teaching things "by hand" that students have no use for. They have calculators. Soon they will all have access to smartphones 24-7 and free websites like Wolframalpha.com (which can solve most math problems like a click of a button.) What will happen when a kid can just punch in "2x+3y=5 and 5x+3y^2=9" into a search bar and get an answer? Maybe we should spend our time on meaningful problems in the REAL world and leave raw, intense computing to... computers. Maybe that's why they call them computers, because they compute for you. Isn't that the point?
I will address these points in posts to come, but I hope you will find this blog insightful, witty and most of all I hope it give you faith to keep moving forward. You are not alone.
Keep the faith.
I have been a math teacher for 7 years. I will likely keep teaching until this June because I lost faith in the systems ability to right itself from the inside. I don't believe anything short of gutting whats there and restructuring the way we all manage from superintendent down to teachers in the classroom will solve the problems our great nation faces. Education is a mess, until I feel like I can be productive as a teacher again I will not return to the profession. There are also other personal factors involved with my choice to leave like starting a family.
Teaching is the hardest job in the world!!! PERIOD!
One fellow at a bar I was visiting said "Teaching is easy! Once you get started you just have to dust off lesson plans and do the same thing every year until your 3 month vacation" People like him have no knowledge of the reality of any classroom. It kind of reminds of when Rush Limbaugh told a caller that the price of his recent doctor visits were less than the cost of an SUV and were perfectly reasonable. Hey Rush, $15,000 is a lot of money to OTHER people.
Attention teacher haters: I have a challenge for you! Name one other job where you are charged to manage a bunch of workers who don't get paid anything, are forced to go to work everyday, can't usually be fired, aren't usually screened before they are hired, and, worst of all, know if they don't work it will be you who is blamed for it. As a manager you can't use tough language or physical force to get them to work. You are also held accountable to at least three entities who often have conflicting interests. (peers, parents, administrators, district policy, state standards, district standards, etc.) In addition, you will have to pay for all of your training and must take college courses to keep your job.
Good luck!
The purpose of this blog is to create awareness of and spread ideas that educators may find insightful and helpful. To this end, most of my posts will be about or connected to at least one of the following ideas.
1) Choice Theory and the Deming management model must used in education.
2) Math must "grow up"! I mean that as a statement of where math is and also as a challenge to professors and others in the field to be aware of technologies ever-changing role in the process of mathematics. Currently we are teaching things "by hand" that students have no use for. They have calculators. Soon they will all have access to smartphones 24-7 and free websites like Wolframalpha.com (which can solve most math problems like a click of a button.) What will happen when a kid can just punch in "2x+3y=5 and 5x+3y^2=9" into a search bar and get an answer? Maybe we should spend our time on meaningful problems in the REAL world and leave raw, intense computing to... computers. Maybe that's why they call them computers, because they compute for you. Isn't that the point?
I will address these points in posts to come, but I hope you will find this blog insightful, witty and most of all I hope it give you faith to keep moving forward. You are not alone.
Keep the faith.
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