And the old way didn’t just say 5 x 6 = 30.

The old way showed 5 blocks of 6 or 6 groups of 5. The problem with MI is that is never seems to go past those blocks.

These kids will not be able to do long division like 765 divided by 43…that should concern parents. Instead they will subtract out groups of 43 until they come up with enough subtracted 43s to come close to 765. Then they add up all those little groups of 43 that they subtracted and get the answer and a remainder, if applicable. It takes a whole page to do one lousy problem and with the multiple subtractions and additions (far more than the normal method and things are not neatly lined up), there are far more opportunities for math errors there leading to an incorrect answer. I can imagine what will happen with the SOLs.

I’m not completely knocking MI because it may have its good points, but when I haven’t found a single teacher that likes it, that makes me worried. Perhaps they are worried about the SOLs because if these kids mess up, the teacher’s neck is on the line. Notice how many third grade teachers are complaining. That is because they know exactly what knowledge is required to pass that test and they realized the kids coming out of last year’s 2nd grade MI experiment aren’t cutting it and they won’t be ready for spring SOLs. Maybe MI is great for long term math learning but we have the problem that SOLs are mandatory now. And they are a law, so unless we change the law, we shouldn’t start tinkering around with math reforms that won’t help these kids pass the tests that they must pass. Personally I absolutely hate that we teach to the test, but until the law changes, it seems to be a mistake to to risk every school in the county failing to make AYP just to prove a point. Almost half of our schools couldn’t cut it this year and it will only get harder next year.

Our reputation will have gone from World Class Education to Third World Education.

My daughter’s teaching seems to be OK with MI. He (yes, he) is a little concerned about SOLs because the pacing and sequencing in MI doesn’t match 1:1 with the Virginia SOLs, though he thinks his students will be fine. When I talked to him about the whole program, he was positive and said he saw some great things coming out of his students. From other teachers I’ve talked to, the one thing they say they really could use is more inservice training. I think a lot of the concern raised by parents and echoed by some teachers stems from the very issue you raise. By and large elementary school teachers fall into that group that says “I was never really a math person” yet they are being asked to teach the foundations for our future math whizzes. The “old way” was comfortable for them because it was familiar and doesn’t require being able to answer the tougher questions.

Old way:
Teacher: 5×6=30
Student: Why?
Teacher: Because it is. Next…

MI Way:
Teacher: How can we figure what 5 x 6 is? What does 5×6 mean? and so on…

The TERC program recommends a two-week pre-service for teachers new to MI. PWCS requires just a day and half. If there is any place that criticism can be aimed, it is at the lack of training and preparation provided to the teachers who have to implement this program.

In reference to your earlier post, I used a slide rule for high school chemistry. Does that date me? I didn’t see a calculator until college.

1 + 1 = 10 as an equation, is INCORRECT in both base-ten and binary.

One plus one equals ten. That’s just wrong no matter how you slice it. You don’t use the word “plus” in binary unless you write out the entire algorythm like trying to figure out that 1,0 represents the numeral 2.

You might get away with saying 1&1=3, since one, one is the binary representation of the number three. But, as an equation, 1+1 has absolutely no meaning in the binary system. As a matter of fact, just putting in “1″ has no meaning, it would be “01.” Binary - “bi” - “two” spaces.

Try this: 0,1 + 0,1 = 1,0 that is the closest you can get to representing the base-ten numeral 2 in a binary fashion using arithmatic operators.

Will you provide those links to Dr. Walts please? He also brought a few EEOC suits that our school board didn’t know about. Oh and did we mention wire tapping the Greece, NY school board room? I heard some rumblings about that also. The guy who did that supposedly came to PW with him.

I hated abstract algebra the worst. That was painful.

You’re not that old, are ya? I think the abacus has become a glorified back massager.

But I have a beautiful slide rule (circa 1963).

Thanks for reminding me. I’ll have to see what that can bring on eBay.

I loved the wikipedia entry…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigations_in_Numbers%2C_Data%2C_and_Space

i thought boolean algebra was far more painful that DE, after taking a bunch of calc DE was pretty smooth sailing, what’s even more painful is that I switched major’s to justice studies after deciding not to be an engineer so the math was pretty useless, although I did enjoy it

I did a google on mr Walts. He came to us via Greece NY. Guess what math program they used up there…yup TERC! It set off a huge battle which the press donned the “NY math war”. As far as I know they are still duking it out there. So let me get this right, our illustrious superintendent threw an incendiary bomb in his last position via MI then leaves under a cloud of legal problems and comes here and starts the same thing all over???? WOW! I’ll keep researching.

And now the school system has no way to back up their claims that this math program works. They have an internet filled with thousands and thousands of parents saying that it stinks and stories of states who’ve spent millions only to have to throw the entire program out the window.

Why didn’t they have a longer pilot program so they could substantiate their claims that it will help test scores? That would have helped shut up the critics and provided a foundation to assure parents. I could be a believer because I get the concept of the program. That is I could be a believer if I saw results, but now I just see a mess.

The sad thing is we’ll probably never know whether the program works or not because the school system was so stupid with the way they approached it. There is a reason new drugs are tested for several years before they are released into the market, although I don’t advocate testing Math investigations on mice.

The SOLs will probably be terrible, and the pubblic will be outraged. They’ll tar and feather the school board, who will fire Dr. Walts and bring in some other bird brain who coincidentally will bring another whacked out math program with him and we’ll start the whole mess all over again. The PWC taxpayers will pick up the bill just like they’re picking up the bill to build walls in all those 1970’s schools that were built when open concept classrooms were “brilliant, creative, and going to revolutionize educating our children”….sound familiar?

I guess there really is something to homeschooling.