Posts in category National News
Common Core and Deep Understanding?
May 29, 2013
Common Core And ‘Deep Understanding’
On the Brown Center Chalkboard, a blog produced by the Brookings Institution, Tom Loveless has a terrific post (not just because he cites me). He writes:
Deeper Learning is the current term for an old idea. The notion is that schools spend too much time focused on the acquisition o [...]
Rich Kids will get it somewhere else&...
The premise is simple. If public schools don’t teach algebra or chemistry or history or great literature or how to write well—the old-fashioned learning that has been around for centuries and remains high status knowledge in most cultures—rich kids will get it somewhere else. Poor kids won’t.
Tom Loveless | May 29, 2013 11:00am
The [...]
WSJ: Common Core Education Is Uncommo...
Jamie Gass and Charles Chieppo: Common Core Education Is Uncommonly Inadequate
The federal intrusion in schools also brings standards that are academic-lite.
May 27, 2013, 6:42 p.m. ET By JAMIE GASS
AND CHARLES CHIEPPO
Massachusetts student test scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress and SATs were unremarkable in th [...]
Some states are pushing back on the c...
math/2013/05/28/82d8ad94-c76b-11e2-9cd9-3b9a22a4000a_story.html
May 28, 2013 07:52 AM EDT
Updated: Tuesday, May 28, 12:52 AM
By Associated Press
Of the 45 states that adopted the Common Core reading, math and writing standards, nine are having second thoughts.
Some states are seeking to slow implementation, while others are trying to repea [...]
Two Moms vs. Common Core
Indiana has become the first state to retreat from the Common Core standards, as Governor Mike Pence has just signed a bill suspending their implementation.
A great deal has been written and spoken about Common Core, but it is worth rehearsing the outlines again. Common Core is a set of math and English standards developed largely w [...]
Students who receive free lunch outpe...
Students who receive free lunch outperform more affluent districts. So affluence is not a major determining factor in performance as some districts make it seem.
Still, it’s an impressive accomplishment by the two city schools: At Bronx Science, 46 percent of students receive free or reduced-price lunch; at Stuyvesant, 42 percent. Yet these [...]
System Failure: The Collapse of Publi...
Comment to Article : How about that After more than a decade using uber trendy Teachers College reading programs and NCTM “new-new” math programs in NYC we see what some warned of long ago, certainly parents in Manhattan where the programs were piloted – who were forced to tutor their children halfway through their K- [...]
The Latest TIMSS and PIRLS Scores
In December 2012, the latest international test scores were released. The Trends in International Math and Science Study (TIMSS) is given every four years, and the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) is given every five years. The latest results came from the 2011 administration of both tests, a unique event. Because of [...]
Improving Math Success in Higher Educ...
Many students begin higher education unprepared for college-level work in mathematics and must take non-credit developmental courses. Furthermore, many are math-phobic and avoid courses, majors and careers that involve quantitative work. Yet science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields are among the few job-growth are [...]
Math Debate… Fourth Grade canno...
Countless students across the country whose lack of basic math skills may hurt their college career. Will they be “college and career ready” with these reform math programs? Practice your multiplication… master the fundamentals, so you can move on to more advanced math material.
Reform Math is heavy on story problems and lig [...]
U.S. Students Still Lag Globally in M...
December 11, 2012 – NY Times
By MOTOKO RICH Clich here for link
Fourth- and eighth-grade students in the United States continue to lag behind students in several East Asian countries and some European nations in math and science, although American fourth graders are closer to the top performers in reading, according to test results r [...]
DEATH of MATH
= Death of Math
There is a very good reason that there are so many charter schools in Alpine School District that use Saxon math. Thousands of parents fled the district starting around 2001 when the district wouldn’t listen to them that Investigations math was a disaster.
The district’s mantra was “all the studies show this is the best way [...]
Will Common Core put an end to Math W...
EN: Will the Common Core put an end to what has sometimes been termed the “math wars”? In your view, do the math standards resemble those recommended by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), and what do you make of that similarity (or lack thereof)?
WSW: The end of the math wars! You must be joking.
There will always be peop [...]
Is Algebra Necessary?
Is Algebra Necessary?
By ANDREW HACKER
A TYPICAL American school day finds some six million high school students and two million college freshmen struggling with algebra. In both high school and college, all too many students are expected to fail. Why do we subject American students to this ordeal? I’ve found myself moving toward the strong v [...]
The Pedagogical Agenda of Common Core...
The popular interpretation of SMP is a pedagogical agenda that features student-centered and inquiry-based approaches.
Discovery and group learning approaches to math have had poor results when they have been used in classrooms across the country.
… Such a process while eliminating what the edu-establishment views as tedious “drill and [...]
Singapore Math: Expect more schools i...
“My students actually have become better math thinkers,” said Scott Sheets, a fifth-grade math teacher at Clays Mill Elementary, which began using Singapore math this year.
As its name indicates, Singapore math was developed in the small southeast Asian nation that bears its name. It has attracted the interest of American educators because st [...]
‘Innovative’ Math, but Ca...
“My whole experience in math the last few years has been a struggle against the program,” Jim said recently. “Whatever I’ve achieved, I’ve achieved in spite of it. Kids do not do better learning math themselves. There’s a reason we go to school, which is that there’s someone smarter than us with somet [...]
The Common Core Math Standards
the Common Core defers fluency in division to grade 6. Fractions are touted as the Common Core’s greatest strength, yet the Common Core pushes teaching division of fractions to grade 6 without ever expecting students to master working with a mix of fractions and decimals. Students in Singapore, Japan, Korea, and Hong Kong achieve fluency in f [...]
The Poverty Myth Persists
Want a convenient scapegoat for our problems? Poverty. It’s there, it’s handy.
I sat through an hour meeting of our small school district’s budget committee last week, most of it devoted to bemoaning our fate as a “poor district” (over 60 percent of our kids qualify for free and reduced-price lunch, the standard definition of “poor” for schoo [...]
It’s Not Just Writing: Math Nee...
Today’s fashion is to throw away the textbook and to teach kids to think like mathematicians. The problem? They’re not learning how to do actual math.
This is where reform texts come in. In the early 1990′s, the National Science Foundation awarded grants to various universities and institutions to develop math programs tha [...]
A statistician’s view of constructivi...
I’ve had 4 years of undergraduate math courses, two years of graduate math courses, and I have taught graduate-level math courses. I had never seen the “lattice” method, the Egyptian method, or any of these other alternative algorithms until last year when I looked at Everyday Math homework. Students don’t need them, and those met [...]
2+2=5 Fuzzy Math Invades Wisconsin Sc...
What is it about this new approach to teaching math that so concerned these parents? The “new-new” math classroom is based on the notion that children understand and learn only those concepts that they “construct” or discover on their own. The teacher is discouraged from providing information or imparting knowledge, an [...]
U.S lag in science, math a disaster i...
Almost everyone, from educators to government officials to industry experts, laments the lackluster abilities and performance of our nations’ students in science, technology, engineering and math (know as STEM education).Two indicators are particularly worrisome, especially as this country experiences greater global competition and high [...]
In defense of direct instruction: Con...
Many educators believe children should learn math by struggling and failing, inventing their own methods, drawing pictures and boxes, counting on fingers, play-acting, continually working in groups, and asking several classmates for help before asking the teacher. This process of learning is called constructivism (also known as “discovery” or [...]
You Tube of Michael DeBell’s co...
BOE member, DeBell’s comment on Discovering Series, a constructivist math program. This is the third time he has gone through an math curriculum adoption as BOE member. Michael DeBell, Seattle School Board President, took the time to research the math curriculum recommendations in his district. He showed a great example of informed o [...]
Haverford HS Students, Parents Debate...
Parents and students who were opposed to CPM said they do not think the program is effective because CPM’s group learning approach (in which students in the classroom work in groups to solve math problems) does not meet all students’ learning styles. Parents opposed to the program also said they do not think CPM has raised standardized test s [...]
Lower Merion Fifth Graders Prepare fo...
A major CPM shortcoming is that it favors children with strong language skills. Making math all about words must be demoralizing for a lot of boys in particular who might typically excel in math but not language arts. And for the children who learn best in a structured environment, like mine, forget it. CPM is a Berkeley invention that I imag [...]
Singapore Math arriving in Bridgeport...
The new books include a literacy series called “Journeys,” a math series that focuses on Singapore Math, a teaching method in sync with the proposed Common Core State Standards being developed in the state and nationwide.
Read more: http://www.ctpost.com/local/article/New-books-arriving-in-Bridgeport-schools-3657645.php#ixzz2CyFG [...]
Vallas calls for creating new high sc...
Vallas, regarded as a prominent public education reformer, was hired by the state-appointed school district in January. His task was to not only balance the budget but to help the district.
The plan would cut central office staff by one-third and reduce the number of school aides — there are more than 400 in the district. To compensate, [...]
American Teens Trail Global Peers in ...
The test, called the Program for International Student Assessment, has been given every three years since 2000 to 15-year-old students. Last year, when the test was administered, 60 countries participated. The test is designed to assess how prepared teenagers are in three key categories—mathematics, science and reading—versus their peers in [...]
As Math Skills Slip, U.S. Schools See...
The Singapore method continues to attract fans. Inspired by North Middlesex, 20 schools in 12 different districts across Massachusetts are now running Singapore pilot programs. North Middlesex is a farming and commuter district that’s an hour’s drive from Boston.
North Middlesex’s program got rolling soon after the educatio [...]
Arthur Levine: The Suburban Education...
The U.S. economy could be $1 trillion a year stronger if Americans only performed at Canada’s level in math.
The problem America faces, then, is that its urban school districts perform inadequately compared with their suburban counterparts, and its suburban districts generally perform inadequately compared with their international count [...]
Controversy over Mathematics in Penfi...
Since early 2005 a parent group in Penfield (a suburb of Rochester), New York, has been fighting for quality mathematics programs in their public schools. Curricula in the Penfield schools are among the worst of the NCTM-inspired “fuzzy” mathematics programs for their respective grades: (TERC) Investigations in Number, Data, and [...]
Court ruled that the Seattle BOE made...
In the Superior Court of the State of Washington, Honorable Julie Spector ruled that the board’s decision to use the Discovering series was arbitrary and capricious. She ordered the board to reconsider the matter. Seattle’s so-called “Discovery” math curriculum doesn’t add up for a Judge Spector, who rejected the style of instruction and or [...]
Controversial math textbooks adopted ...
The Discovery series textbook focuses on helping students uncover math concepts on their own instead of laying out rules for memorization. But state math experts disagree about the effectiveness of the Discovering series. Board President Michael DeBell previously said he was not satisfied with the Discovering textbooks because they can’ [...]
‘Innovative’ Math, but Ca...
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/09/education/08education.html?pagewanted=all
This community of 35,000 battled with the nationwide math wars, which have flared from California to Pittsburgh to the former District 2 on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, pitting progressives against traditionalists. Penfield School District began supplementing the [...]
Recent Comments