When I was a child and had a question about my math homework, I was blessed (although probably at the time felt cursed) that both of my parents were Math Majors. On these occasions, my evenings would consist of additional math instruction typically accompanied by the ever familiar discussion over which of them graduated from the more prestigious Jesuit campus of Fordham University. My father claiming he graduated from the ‘real’ Fordham but my mother always held her own in the debate. In hindsight, I recognize that women from my mother’s generation typically did not become engineers but were encouraged to become nurses, teachers, secretaries. But, I digress. What is important is that I was well served by their instruction and encouragement and have since had every math class of an electrical engineer. For a decade, until I decided to stay home with the children, I was a programmer alongside some of the brightest analytical minds from around the globe. But now it’s my turn to take the role as a supplementary instructor to my children with their math homework.
So, I’ll admit when I first became aware of the ‘Math Investigations’ program adopted by the County, I wasn’t overly concerned with the program because my children are bright and the fifth grader would be ‘transitioned’. However, after witnessing the effect this program has had on my children I’m convinced it’s not a productive way to teach math. In fact, I’m convinced someone with a double ‘e’ major has developed it; and I’m not talking about an Electrical Engineer but rather an individual with an Elementary Ed Degree.
I have told this story before but let me repeat it for the edification of everyone. During my sophomore year of college, after my calculus class, where I most likely was working on differential equations or something equally as challenging, I went back to my apartment and found my Elementary Ed roommate cutting out squares and lining them up in rows and columns. She then proceeded to count the squares which completely dumbfounded me because I couldn’t understand why anyone would waste their time with this exercise. When I inquired about why she would bother counting them, she told that she ‘just wanted to make sure’. I remember being somewhat appalled at the time, and thinking that someone like her could one day teach my children math. It must have been a premonition of sorts because it IS exactly this same methodology that is now being used on my children.
My fifth-grader has completely forgotten the traditional way of doing double digit multiplication, instead she draws a crazy square ‘lattice’ . My second-grader is breaking down subtraction problems into ‘number statements’ in multiples of 5’s and 10’s, instead of stacking and subtracting. These added steps confuse and often allow additional opportunities for mistakes which increase the chances of her getting the wrong answer.
These methods are so strange to parents that the county holds classes to teach the parents how the children are doing math. It’s absurd. Then certain board members think that because the parent classes are well attended that the program is a success? No, it’s because the concepts are so foreign that they need to take the class to understand what the heck is going on.
So, tonight, I will attend the Prince William County School Board Meeting at 7pm to speak out in opposition to the ‘Math Investigation’ program. I understand there has been a growing resistance to this curriculum for quite some time and I always thought that the school board would realize the folly of their ways and abandon the instruction. Unfortunately this hasn’t happened. Now, I believe this school board might not realize the detriment of this program until a generation of children have been branded with this tainted methodology.
There have been a couple informational websites developed where more can be learned and there’s a petition that can be signed to show your opposition. Please consider adding your voice to those that believe this curriculm is detrimental to our students.
More information can be found here –
More telling than whether people are “satisfied” (a non-empirical measure of an emotional response), is the data on page 3 and page 4 of the report Ed linked to (especially the tables on both of these pages).
Students in Math Investigations are succeeding. Their year-over-year development of math skills is actually at a faster pace than grade level. So much for MI being dumbed down and leaving out kids behind.
Give me a break. They did not take the Stamford tests before MI was introduced so have no way of telling if it is working or not based on that. The report rates their performance “average” within the US. That’s not a great endorsement.
Look at the advance SOL rates; I presented this to the board last night. 2007 to 2008, grades 4 and 5 along with Stafford and Fairfax grade 3 all improved significantly; PWC grade 3 with MI – flat (actually small decline).
Base SOL grade 3 pass, flat.
And yes, of course the teachers were “invited”. As citizens, they are allowed to speak the same as the rest of us but the way it was stacked with teachers and friends of teachers was a little distorting.
And while we are at it, perhaps you could persuade the math dept. to release the county-wide Cogat scores (or however it is spelled). They seem reluctant..
From the people I have heard from (obviously not a statistically significant sample), the computational results are very low as predicted by supporters of traditional math.
MI supporters seem to take a very black and white view of the role of MI. I like some of the MI lessons; I hate the dogma surrounding it’s implementation, the pace of the lessons, the lack of practice at simple arithmetic and the delayed introduction of efficient algorithms. Kicking of with word problems at a very early age is wrong according to the national math panels’ recommendations; the kids need the number sense before trying real-world problems.
I hesitate to mention it, but what the hell “Once more into the breach”.
I think the issue that seems to have slipped below everyone’s radar is the purported reasoning behind the implementation of MI, namely, the perceived/proven retreat in math proficiency, particularly that exhibited at the middle and high school level.
If I understood those middle and high school teachers correctly, they have seen proficiency slipping and believe that MI will reverse the course. As a side note, some of those same teachers have stated that they have already seen the results, a neat trick given that none of our precious guinea pigs have arrived in those middle and high school classes to date, but I digress. It occurs to me that they are banking on an unproven system to address the perceived shortcomings of traditional math, shortcomings that have only become apparent in relatively recent years. A roll of the dice, perhaps, a well-intensioned effort to improve scores, maybe, a calculaled effort to draw parents attention away from the real problem, most likely.
Traditional math seems to have worked out just fine for those responsible for the engineering and scientific breakthroughs of the past half century. It also seems to have worked well in the absence of pocket calculators. Perhaps the real problem is not the curriculum but rather the teaching and I am not confining that merely to the teachers, parents are just as responsible. It is increasingly apparent that getting the answer correct is less important than ensuring that Little Johnny feels good about himself and is properly socialized. No big deal if you count 14 socks instead of 13, but in the real world, dropping a decimal or making a one digit error can have catastrophic consequences. We might still be fighting WWII if Einstein’s theory were E=MC cubed and Neil Armstrong would still be outbound if a Nasa engineer had estimated the trajectory of a moonshot. Hmm, wonder if those Wall Street geniuses were taught MI.
The real problem isn’t the traditional curriculum, its the instruction and expectations. There, I said it, go sick Dr. Walts and the PC police on me.
What I don’t get is if MI is turning out such little math wonders, why are they sneaking connected math into the middle schools;
On one hand, Ms Knight told me there would be no problem transitioning to the middle school traditional math because MI teaches them to tackle any math problem.
On the other hand, they are telling the middle school teachers to learn to deal with the influx that won’t be familiar with traditional maths.
Something smells fishy to me..
In terms of the SDMT, the argument has been made by opponents of MI that MI is going to leave our children behind grade level and at a disadvantage because they are not learning what they should be when they should be. Regardless of whether they are learning as fast or as much as before, the SDMT results make is clear that the “our children are being left behind by this dangerous experiment” argument is pure hokum. Based on the SDMT results, children in MI have moved ahead at least at the rate expected and in a number of demographics more than expected over the course of a year.
CogAT is an aptitude, not achievement, test. It attempts to measure innate ability to do quantitative, verbal, and non verbal cognition, not learned behavior. So, if the quantitative results are, indeed, “low,” then we have a generation of students whose quantitative cognitive aptitude is lower than expected (which would correlate with the differences you note between PWC and Fairfax if, for instance, Fairfax’s CogAT scores are higher).
I agree that the “set in stone” dogma that standard algorithms are to be avoided and the use of non-standard math vocabulary (“refactoring” vs. “borrowing”, for instance) is problematic. I disagree with the idea that practice is lacking. From studies of the human brain and how we assemble information, immediate, extensive repetition is not as important as periodic review and repetition (which MI provides). (I’d suggest reading _Brain Rules_ by John Medina for an in depth look at how the brain “learns” and forms concrete memory). Further, MI provides many opportunities for enrichment for gifted or accelerated students. The lack of such challenges in PWCS is a problem that stems for curtailed training and preparation for the rollout of MI county-wide (two days of inservice training versus the two weeks recommended by the publisher).
Respectfully, I also think you miss the point of the “number sense” recommendations from the NMAP. That doesn’t mean teaching the mechanical process of solving equations using standard algorithms. It refers to developing a deeper understanding of the meaning behind the symbols and numbers. Elementary mathematics should be about building that mathematical fluency more than it is about teaching efficient means to an end. We teach whole words before moving on to contractions.
“We teach whole words before moving on to contractions.”
Two plus two is always four, at least in this dimension. Basic math is by and large a mechanical process and memorizing the basic is substantially different than abstract math or calculus.
On the other hand, which definition of contraction are you referring to, shortened words, the muscular movement, reduction in economic activity, … Apples and Oranges TPWB.
As you can tell, I don’t have the edu-speak and was educated in another country.
I do however, have the experience of having one child in each program.
Lack of practice is a major problem because the kids are not developing the instant recall needed to ease their progress at higher levels. One of TERCs own school aids in Boston said as much in a blog before the publisher pulled it.
If the lifework consists of 2 problems once a week, they get practice at solving a particular kind of problem but not practice at recall of math facts. Memorization of math facts on it’s own is obviously not sufficient but it is also required to make the solutions more efficient. That is the major piece that is missing; efficiency of calculation.
Oh and I don’t see any enrichment or advanced math going on; the teacher can’t deal with 27 kids all interacting and provide differentiation.
Those who see basic math as simply a mechanical process often fail to understand basic concepts later on down the road.
I watched the school board meeting. I saw very few, if any, minority parents, yet PWCS is a majority minority school system. Where were their parents last night? How do those parents feel about the program?
As for personnel, I have never known Mrs. Knight to be anything but courteous.
Teachers work for the superintendent who was hired by the school board. The school board is elected by the citizens. No teacher works for any parent.
At least one person I heard speak needs to go review the heirarchy and to realize that they do not employ PW Co teachers.
Mom – Great comments. I remember reading that the justification for implementing Investigations wasn’t declining ES test scores because those were rising, it was lower than expected SAT and middle school SOL scores, and what struck me as odd was the decision to implement a new elementary math curriculum in an effort to address those problems. Shouldn’t we have looked at the middle and high school curriculum first in an effort to address those problems rather than the elementary school curriculum? To my knowledge nothing has changed in either the HS or MS programs so, did the school system just give up on those students and decide to dedicate it’s resources to the elementary students? Strange.
As for the SDMT results, they did increase, but that was expected. The SDMT was first given county wide when Investigations was implemented. That year (2007) the second grade average score was about 80% and the first grade average score was about 70%. In 2008 2nd grade scores were unchanged at 80% while 1st grade scores increased 4 points to 74%. The thing is – we’d expect an increase when comparing year 1 to year 2 of an exam because teacher would know what was on the exam and adapt what they teach to it.
Similar increases from 81 in 2006, to 84 in 2007, to 88 in 2008, when the SOL was first given to 4th grade students.
Dolph – I to have noticed a lack of diversity among those speaking either for or against Investigations, and I’m not exactly sure why. When I scan the zip codes on the petition mentioned in the original article I note that they are from all over the county. I also seem to recall the Chairman Johns mentioned (and I may get the number wrong) that he’d received at least 2 emails from 26 different schools. I can’t help but wonder about the other 29 schools…….
I guess from what Ms Lucas said she hasn’t receive any comments from her schools so I guess those would be included in the 29.
I have a sneaking suspicion that the administration does not want to look at the root cause of the problems in high school. This might be impolitic and I mean no offense, but some people just don’t have the aptitude or desire for higher math. The same can be said for AP English or physics. The problem as I see it is that in the vainglorious pursuit of all things academic, the schools (and by that I mean virtually all systems) have diminshed if not eliminated virtually all vocational training. Back in the dark ages, I had the opportunity to follow the Poindexter route and take AP courses, Calculus, Physics, etc. While that opportunity has been expanded upon, those little Johnnys without the aptitude or desire for an advanced degree no longer have the Elrod option whereby they could pursue a technical trade such as plumbing, bricklaying, welding, auto mechanics, engineering drafting, cosmetology, etc. I had friends on both sides of that line in the academic sand and quite frankly many of those in the trades have a higher standard of living than those who chose the collegiate path. I guess its no wonder our kids can’t change a tire or figure out where to put the oil.
Very well put. You’re probably correct. Honestly, I prefer to blot my dark ages from my memory!!!
Dolph – for what I’ve researched, there are two general schools of thought regarding mathematics education (and I say general because the descriptions are rather nonspecific). The first is the school of though behind texts like Investigations – which hold that the standard algorithms and memorized formulas and math facts adversely affect the development of number sense and understanding and should be delayed until the child has a full and complete understanding of the concepts of numbers. The other, which underlies texts we characterize as traditional like Singapore and SFAW, holds that mastery of the standard algorithms and math facts to the point of automaticity frees the mind to explore more abstract concepts.
Because of the belief that the standard algorithms are dangerous, Investigations doesn’t work well with picking and choosing or changing lessons. It really is best as an independent, standalone curriculum. As such a curriculum which blends the best of Investigations with the best of other curricula is probably impossible. A blend will have to come from a traditional text supplemented with Investigations at the teachers discretion. As long as the county remains wedded to keeping Investigations as it’s primary curricula that means two tracks, with the alternate, traditional track available at the parents discretion, will have to be supported.
Vocational training has gone by the wayside which is too bad. Many kids are not ready and will never be ready for advanced courses. Yet NCLB and the State all seem to think everyone needs an advanced degree. Perhaps that explains the increase in high school drop outs.
Maybe everyone could take Math Investigations and those whose kids were bored could take additional math classes instead of music, art, library or PE? Kids probably wouldn’t like that.
Turn PW Blue- You mentioned looking at Cogat scores for PWC vs Fairfax, I haven’t even come across the historical PWC scores posted anywhere. Can you please share a link to where you found those little gems? thx
My kid loves the extra math he does at home; they want to be challenged, they don’t enjoy being bored.
The opt into traditional and return to traditional core text in 5th grade will do for now assuming we can get it passed. The results and choices parents make will hopefully finish the job.
Jake – I’m not sure pulling children whose parents would prefer a traditional math program from PE or music or art would solve the problem, especially as PE, art, music, computer, lab, science, and library all have tremendous educational value.
But you make a good point, well, many good points but this one jumped out at me. 🙂 Our children already rotate at school for encores – many classes even split for encores and one group follows one schedule while another group follows a different schedule. Math could simply be another rotation and kids would simply go with their group to whichever math program they follow. So we wouldn’t have a school within a school, we’d just have kids going to different classrooms for math.
[…] or check out any number of blogs and newspaper accounts of the action, including :BVBL, Anti-BVBL, and Inside NOVA. You know you’ve hit on a hot topic when BVBL and Anti-BVBL agree on an […]
Kids have changed classes for years in PWC. Scheduling will always be a problem because of the relatively small size of elementary schools.
jp–never said I saw the CogAT scores. Just presented a hypothesis concerning performance vis a vis another district.
Turn PW Blue – You mentioned that CogATs measure innate abilities. Actually, it does NOT measure innate abilities. As stated here on the publishers web site, http://www.riverpub.com/products/cogAt/support.html#2
it measures abilities developed through experiences in school and outside of school. So low quantitative results could indicate a problem with the curriculum.
You’ll have to give him time to check with Ms Knight before responding to that one 😉
The cogAT is a norm referenced abilities test, not an achievement test. Your abilities are developed from the day of your birth. Do experiences alter abilities tests? Yes, to a slight degree. So does illness, depression, and other emotional episodes.
Generally speaking, low scores on an achievement test MIGHT indicate curriculum issues. Low achievement on a math test might also indicate low or average ability as indicated on a cogAT or similar test.
SOL are criterion-referenced tests. They test if you grasped what was taught to you. So when teachers are accused of teaching to the test on an SOL, bingo. They are pretty much doing what they have been directed to do by the curriculum.
Princess Billy-Bob is correct. It’s impossible to teach to a CogAT test. If you’ve ever reviewed the sample CogAT booklets PWCS 3rd graders bring home before the test, you’ll see that the quantitative/non-verbal sections DO NOT test math achievement. You’ll see no “traditional” number sentences, computations or word problems. Rather, they use numbers, symbols and patterns to test a child’s number sense and innate ability in that area.
You can find a sample test here:
http://web.pccs.k12.mi.us/tag/PDF-Documents/TAG-PDF-FILES/CogATsampletestt.pdf
These are the tests the county uses to identify 3rd graders for Gifted Services. If a child meets a benchmark (97th percentile) in the verbal and/or non-verbal battery, they are identified and further evaluated for inclusion in Signet (the county’s GT program).
Actually, MI is big on number sense, patterns and symbols so it can help kids with the “language” of the CogAT better — much more so than algorithms would.
Kids who are very spatial (ie., love challenging puzzles, legos, tangrams, etc.) typically score well on the non-verbal/quantitative battery. These are things children are typically exposed to at home — and often before they ever start school.
Given that these are individual assessments of individual talents (or areas of weakness), I don’t know that it’s even possible or reasonable to compile the scores and use them to prove or disprove the success of the MI curriculum.
OK, well now I’m confused. I thought PWCS used the Naglieri to determine inclusion in the gifted program. If the Naglieri is used to identify gifted students, then what is the CogAT used for and why two tests?
They use Naglieri and CogAT. Nagilieri is especially good at identifying ESOL kids because it is non-language-based test that measures a child’s nonverbal and quantitative abilities.
http://pearsonassess.com/haiweb/cultures/en-us/productdetail.htm?pid=015-8706-005
http://pearsonassess.com/haiweb/cultures/en-us/productdetail.htm?pid=015-8706-005
I should add that all PWCS third graders take both CogAT and Naglieri.
A battery of tests is used for older kids when screening for SIGNET. Naglieri is sometimes used, sometimes not, depending on the child and the circumstances.
For general third grade screening purposes:
http://pwcs.edu/Gifted/documents/IdentificationSectionIIILocalPlan-12-06.pdf
The “lattice” method is taught in fifth grade and is part of the regular (i.e. traditional) math textbook. It is not Math Investigations.
Are you the same woman I laughed at the other night, watching the school board meeting, for making this mistake?
SToSay,
Yes, I am the one who mentioned the lattice method. One of my children is currently in fifth grade but she learned the method in fourth grade not fifth. And, unfortunately, that was all she remembered when I asked her to multiply two, two digit numbers.
If it’s not math investigations, it’s something equally as nutty and shouldn’t be taught to the extent that it is.
Anyways, we are now supplementing with math workbooks which is apparently what the school board members are doing that have children in the system.
Here’s a question to all parents in the system grade k-4th. What would happen IF your child actually did NOT take the SOLS for their grade? If you decided as a parent/s to opt your child out of state testing what do you think would happen? Would your child be retained?….no. Would your child be unable to graduate from HS?….no. Would your child not be eligible for GT services?…no. Funny thing is as parents, we know we can opt out of FLE, and we can even opt out of sped testing. But very few parents realize that at the elem level, we have the right to opt our students out of the SOL tests as well.
DB,
What could be gained or lost by opting out of the SOLs?
individual elementary children could gain alot of peace of mind by not having to be a part of a state testing process that has yet to prove itself with any sort of nationaly normed validity and reliablity. Students could be freed from test packets and the like. The losers would be the indidual elem schools that rely on the test scores of their students for both fame and funds, and the parents that believe so much in the hype of the scores. Schools could save money by not putting their focus on remediation or the VGLAs, children could spend more time at recess or PE. The children would certainly gain from a release from the elem SOLS, and quite possibly their teachers could too.
Why is the lattice method “nutty”? Simply because it is not the way you were taught? Or because it doesn’t appeal to the way your mind works?
If the method works for your daughter, makes sense to her, and helps her find the right answer then you are doing her a grave disservice by compelling her to abandon it. Not all brains work the same way, and the algorithms that were easy and workable for you in your youth were not so easy and workable for everyone. If you daughter thrives by using some of the alternative conceptual options she has learned, it is selfish of you to mock them just because they aren’t what you know.
In my opinion, this Math Investigations controversy is far more about the parents than the children.
Do you have kids in the program? We didn’t get involved because we don’t get it.
I get it. I’ve tried all their methods. Some have use but only after the basics have been mastered. That’s what the teachers say (those that dare to speak out).
What kind of a school system are we running here?
The lattice method is not MI but it is confusing and not scalable.
By daughter was confused by it until I told her she didn’t need it.
The controversy is about a weak, dumbed down program that is not producing the promised rewards being pushed by a school system more concerned with ego and posturing than what is best for the kids.
I say that I think the “controversy is far more about the parents than the children” and the very next post completely illustrates my point.
Your post is all about how YOU get it, and YOU’ve tried the methods and how angry YOU are at the school system. The only time you even mention your child is to say that one math concept confused her. Wow, a child confused by something in math? That’s certainly never happened before!
This isn’t about the kids at all. It is about a bunch of adults who didn’t like that they were told they weren’t in charge, so they are throwing a hissy fit and taking up time and resources that should be going to serve all of our children. (Like my three, to answer your question.)
Math Investigations isn’t dumb; it is far more advanced conceptually than “traditional math.” And the shortcuts you are so in love with are the definition of watered-down.
God forbid anything should ever change, right? God forbid your kids try to do something that YOU don’t know how to do. God forbid you support your child and her school by trying to help her learn something you didn’t learn. People like you always manage to hold up progress, but you almost never manage to stop it.
Pompus aren’t you. This is exactly the kind of exchange that your teachers indulged in at the board meeting.
I say “I get it” because the main argument against the parents is that they don’t get it.
My son got what he is doing in 2nd grade when he was in kindergarten and the school hasn’t advanced him. They are not being challenged and abuse from you is not changing that.
The adoption process was floored in many ways and now the math dept is bullying the teachers into supporting them. Sad day.
And since you’re bound to question it further, the opening speaker was a pro-MI advocate who has made a lot of money out of PWC on training classes, one parent on the committee was bullied into agreeing with the math dept, the adoption of 5th grade broke Virginia regs because it isn’t state approved and the FOIAs on that one have been continually dodged.
Quit hiding behind the rhetoric and do what is right for our kids. Choice gets all sides what they want.
What are you afraid of?
There is nothing new or revolutionary about the lattice method. It’s a terrific way to help students understand the steps involved in multiplication. Again, it’s all about number sense.
http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/52468.html
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/LatticeMethod.html
(important take away from this website: “Although the process at first glance appears quite different from long multiplication, the lattice method is actually algorithmically equivalent.”
And by the way, “progress” is how we ended up with the modern math mess of the 70s.
Progress for the sake of doing it differently is not progress.
So many experts say you can’t teach conceptual math until they have the basics. If they can’t add to 20 without taking off their socks, too much time is taken up teaching the simplest of concepts.
You are wasting resources dealing with parents because you did an awful job with the adoption process and a worse job implementing it and responding to the complaints from teachers and parents.
Ha. I love these parents constantly calling MI dumbed down. Ask yourself which is harder, memorizing 4×4 is 16, 4×5 is 20, 4×6 is 24 or figuring out how to work a lattice method. As soon as your kid got confused, you decided the program was dumb. Hm. Also, from your posts and your website I think maybe you all should spend a little less time worrying about math and a little more worrying about spelling and grammar. Yikes.
And an interesting video:
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/326185/the_best_multiplication_method/
The traditional algorithm we learned can get confusing for kids just learning double- an triple-digit multiplication because they have to remember to keep the numbers aligned in descending columns as they multiply each number. My kids (when they were in fourth and fifth grade) inevitbably got confused and frustrated when they would forget why to use a “0” as the place value holder as they shifted columns when multiplying the second and third digit. It made no sense to them, no matter how many times I’d try to explain to them that the number they were using to multiply the top number was in the “tens” spot, so they had to remember to put a “0” down in the “ones” spot before they even started multiplying. With the lattice method, kids HAVE to consciously be aware of the fact that they are separating and placing values in the hundreds, tens and ones places. That will make the traditional algorithm that much easier to learn when the eventually do. And they will.
Then it was badly explained to my 5th grader as she had no idea why she had to learn it and couldn’t follow it.
Thing is, those that oppose MI agree with better explanations and conceptual understanding but we don’t agree that MI is a suitable core text. It’s ok as a supplement but it does not teach mastery of anything. Concepts without the practice is not sufficient.
Calling it “blended” does not make it so. That’s just one of the strategies TERC recommends to school systems when the holes start to appear as they have done in many districts; including ours.
Okay, “Sceptical,” calm down. I’m not sure who you think you are talking to with all you “your teachers” and “you did an awful job with the adoption process.”
I am a parent, with two children in elementary school and one starting this fall. Are you just so preprogrammed with your talking points that you can’t relate to another parent? Not everyone is a mean, ogre of a school administrator, trying to lay waste to your child’s future. I’m just a parent who disagrees with you.
I think that math, and early education, is about building the blocks of future success. I think this can be best done using the knowledge gleaned from advances in what we know about how children think, and how they learn. I think it is progress to make changes to better accomodate what years of scientific and cultural study show us.
You think math, and early education, is about meeting the same timetables of learning you met as a child, and scoring well on (arbitrary) state assessment tests.
You aren’t going to convince me you are right (mostly because you can’t seem to string two coherent sentences together – oh, but is that “pompus”?). And I am obviously not going to change your mind. So let’s just agree to disagree. Now, back to your jihad.
Skeptical: Then let your daughter watch the video. 🙂 It really does break it down pretty clearly, and it’s not any more complicated than the traditional algorithm, with all those descending columns and zeros. 🙂 🙂
I didn’t get lattice at first, either. Then, again, I was one of those kids who cried at the kitchen table some 40 years ago when my father would try to explain the traditional multiplication and long division algorithms to me. 🙂 The lattice strikes me as more logical and straight forward.
SToSay,
Why don’t you tell us your qualifications for making these statements? What’s the highest level math class you’ve had?
I don’t have a problem with my child knowing how to perform multiplication using the lattice method. My problem is that it has became the ONLY WAY in which she could do the problem. The standard algorithm was completely forgotten. I’ll admit lattice is a cute trick. But, when I imagine a working environment where engineers grab a pen & piece of paper to work a problem; I cringe to think she could begin drawing a square with horizontal and diagonal lines through it.
Personally, it’s very telling that the two school board members that currently have kids in the system seem to be supplementing their kids with additional workbooks. But what about all the other kids in the system, has that been recommended to them as well?
Ok, we watched the video and that is how she was taught it.
It doesn’t have any proof of why it works or how to connect it to the standard algorithm.
I don’t see what it gives you. Multiplying by parts is ok as an explanation but it shouldn’t take 1 or 2 years to progress from that to the standard algorithm.
And to J mobely, if you know your times table, you don’t have to work it out every time such as doing long division (which MI doesn’t agree with you learning by the way).
Learning simple arithmetic makes so many things quicker to work out.
I didn’t write the web site but you try teaching math to your kids, holding down a demanding engineering job, campaigning against a nuckle-headed school system and maintaining the web site; it’s a lot of work.
Thankfully, the 1528 people on the petition appreciate what we are doing for their kids.
Alanna,
I’m not supplementing with any workbooks, nor do I plan to in the future. I’ll admit that MI is requiring a huge shift in my thinking of how math should be taught, and there have been some WTF moments for me, as well.
I’ve registered to attend the PWCS February workshops for parents on multiplying and dividing. I had to work with my older kids at math at home when the PWCS had a tradtional curriculum, and I expect to do it with this child and MI. It will help if I know how she’s being taught. In all honesty, I struggled mightly trying to do homework with my older kids (now in HS and college) when they were learning with PWCS’s traditional math curriculum. Many a night I cursed those mathbooks for what Ithought were ridiculous homework pages and busy work that gave my kids an increased understanding of absolutely nothing.
And I’m pretty sure our kids won’t be drawing lattices in middle and high school. 🙂 It’s a teaching tool that, in my household at least, has eliminated a lot of frustration with learning double-, triple- digit multiplication. If my D can move on to using the traditional algorithm with a better understanding of how it works and how to do it, well, I’ll consider that a success.
The PWC math department is not a bunch of bullies. Because they don’t roll over and play dead doesn’t make them bullies. They have to do what they feel is right for all the children. Parents are just interested in their own child. That is how it should be.
Those kids who know various methods of doing arithmetic will be those who are your better mathematicians at higher levels. Those who can think problems through will be your students who are able to use a variety of methods to solve problems including non-routine problems.
Those who go on to get jobs in the real world where math is a heavy component will need to know a variety of methods of solving problems. They definitely will not be solving page after page of algorithms. Algorithms end up being the old monkey analogy: You give enough monkeys enough typewriters they are bound to spell a word.
It wont matter really for the brighter kids. How about all those average and below kids who just might have to understand math to graduate? That’s why the teachers care so deeply.