One small problem with that. We’re supposed to be doing a blended approach now. That’s what the board and math department have been touting for the past year. So if we’re doing a blend now, are we going to be doing a super thick blend after the meeting Tuesday?

It’s probably worth considering just how blended our current curriculum is. Guess what? As this article demonstrates - our current blend is about 10% other material and 90% unadulterated Investigations. http://pwceducationreform.wordpress.com/2009/02/05/where-did-i-put-that-blend/ . And all that blending - that’s just to make Investigations meet SOL standards. It’s not in any of the areas of difference between a classical and reform approach to mathematics education.

Another small problem with the whole blended mantra. Our own staff, in multiple communications and documents has stated that a blend is a very very bad thing.

From documents on the PWCS web site written by PWCS staff… “When the sessions in Investigations are treated as separate activities to be selected or rejected, this careful continuity is lost, and student learning is jeopardized.”

From a February 2006 memo from Pam Gauch to Dr Walts regarding Investigations…. “Research shows that student achievement will be better with the sole use of a traditional program or the sole use of a reform program than if both are used together.”

From documents on the PWCS web site written by PWCS staff ……“Research on program implementation cites inadequate fidelity of implementation as a major reason for program failure”.

Either they were lying then or their just faking the blended thing now knowing that no one on the school board will ever take the time to actually question them on how they’ll achieve this blend and what lessons they’ll blend.

Just for kicks consider this - Investigations is based on a philosophy which believes that learning math facts and standardized processes like the standard algorithms to the point of mastery undermines the development of number sense and reasoning among children - that practice - not just one or two questions but practice over and over again - stops students from thinking about what they’re doing and instead encourages them to automatically execute operations without thought. The philosophy states that such mindless repetition isn’t necessary in today’s technologically advanced society because of the calculator (and that’s directly from their source materials).

Classical mathematics is based on the opposite philosophy - that learning math facts and standardized processes to the point of automatic execution enables students to contemplate more abstract concepts because they aren’t having to work to figure out basic mathematics operations.

How do you blend those two approaches when what they are based on is so far apart? Seriously, how do yo do it? That’s what the math department says they’re going to do, but how?

Remove Investigations lessons on computation and replace them with lessons from classical texts when multi-digit operations are introduced (that would be grade 2 for addition and subtraction and grade 3 for multiplication and division) or just insert a bunch of worksheets and call it a blend? Or do you promise to blend more effectively in the future and work with those schools which seem to be having difficulty blending and provide answers that are sufficient to placate our board but don’t pass muster with informed parents because you know full well that the board will believe whatever you say and that parents will never succeed in exposing you?

Which do you think is likely to happen on Tuesday?

Because this blend we’ve been hearing so much about - it’s not possible. You have to choose one approach or another - you have to follow the Investigations way or the classical way. Sure you can supplement with other materials and call it a blend, but that just marketing and has no basis in fact.

The fact is that you will either be following Investigations approach and limiting exposure to standard processes and operations or you’ll be following a classical approach and teaching standard processes and operations to the point of automaticity. It’s an either or choice.

The opt in for classical math would have allowed parents to enroll their students in a classical mathematics class while maintaining the integrity of the Investigations program. We would have two tracks - one classical and one reform.

But our school board, our lovely school board, is about to rolled under the guise of a blend.

From Prince William County:
” This small group of parents has now started an email campaign via their blog and forum and like the other information they have put out there, their recruitment is based on misinformation. Your efforts are greatly needed to dilute this with positive parents speaking and writing to the Board. As you know, happy people don’t generally write to the Board, but at this time, happy people do need to express themselves also.”

Interesting that Stafford requests that people come give their opinion on constructivist math with no conditions that only people with favorable opinions speak but Prince William only wants people that will speak in favor of it and “dilute” the parents who are opposed.

I think it is the Math Department not the school board that is out of control.

Greg, why don’t you email them a copy of the previous comments?

The reform movement was started, in part, to make mathematics education more female. That was many many years ago and the objective of evening the playing field between boys and girls isn’t an overriding concern anymore, but the movement itself, to an extent, came about out of a desire to equalize math education.

I’d also have to say that, in my opinion, the board was rolled by a math department intent on getting reform math into the county by whatever means necessary when the program was proposed and adopted. It’s been demonstrated how adherence to the VAC was disregarded when the criteria the textbook review committee looked at were developed, it’s been demonstrated how the review process was biased from the beginning, it’s been demonstrated how the review criteria disregarded alignment with state standards, and it’s been demonstrated how the information about the program provided to the board was biased.

I have to hope that the board has done it’s homework now and doesn’t continue to get rolled. At the math work session the September Betty Covington asked the math dept whether a teacher with 20 years of experience who’d turned out highly successful student in the past and questioned whether the Investigations lessons were sufficient and wanted to use the material she knew would help her students, would be allowed to use that material. The answer she got back from the math dept was why would she want to select alternate material - why would that teacher want to deny her students this opportunity.

The board got rolled at the September math session under the guise of balance. I’ve looked at the pacing guides and the Investigations materials and the planning calendars. There is no balance, no blending of approaches - there’s just Investigations. I hope they’ve really done their homework because the math department will continue to say that they’ll provided a blended, balanced program knowing full well that they intend to change nothing.

Cause if the board members haven’t done their homework and aren’t prepared to challenge the math department when they fail to answer questions then the board will get rolled again.

DumbO, our first illegal alien president, way to go idiots!

I can’t understand the sentiment to get rid of the whole board. I think the only reason this issue is up before the board is because 3 members were courageous to bring it up. I am sure the staff certainly did not want the issue debated so without the board we wouldn’t even have a chance at even having a discussion. Maybe some of them straddle because they originally voted for it. I know Mr. Trenum was new last year but how many others are from the original school board that voted for this besides Lattin and Richardson?

And if you’re going to imitate their tactics, at least spell your pejoratives correctly.

Scribimus indocti doctique poemata passim

[Ed note: You are full of baloney. As soon as I found out about this, the following post went up http://www.bvbl.net/index.php/2009/02/05/ready-fire-aim-the-park-whallops-a-legal-immigrant/ ]