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Dude, the "with respect to" clause is a pretty deep idea in calculus that really matters in multi-variate but not so much in uni-variate. I keep seeing how soc

Dude, the "with respect to" clause is a pretty deep idea in calculus that really matters in multi-variate but not so much in uni-variate. I keep seeing how society needs better math education, whether it be statistics or calculus. Well no shit. Unfortunately those are extremely hard subjects to teach in high school. I'd argue statistics is harder to teach than calculus. In calculus you usually derive things by following the formulas. In statistics there isn't always a formula, logic, or path you can follow. I took both AP Calc BC and AP Stats in HS and I'll tell you I learned a lot of calculus then and am learning a lot of statistics now (I'm 32).

optionalparens 10y ago
See my other post, but I have to agree stats is incredibly hard to teach at the high school level. I also see the problem with grandparent's failures at applying math. The huge problem as I mentioned elsewhere is that stats is really applied math. You do learn a lot of regurgitation-style stuff - formulas, proofs, blah blah, but it's all useless without applying it. Moreover, stats draws from so many different areas in math and requires analytical skills that are closer to many of the things scientists emphasize in learning to conduct studies and experiments. This makes it almost unsuitable to teach the more valuable parts of stats at lower levels because the students can't possibly be prepared. At best, I think you can teach some general things about stats and the mentality I described of being analytical and skeptical. Unfortunately, stats is just really hard for anyone to properly and comprehensively learn who isn't going to be able to invest a lot of time both learning pre-requisites and then all the different areas of stats. It's like learning to be a carpenter and only understanding how to work a hammer, but not a saw, measuring tape, or anything else.
baldfat 10y ago
Looking at Common Core anything besides old arcane way of math will never be accepted :(

optionalparens 10y ago

See my other post, but I have to agree stats is incredibly hard to teach at the high school level. I also see the problem with grandparent's failures at applying math. The huge problem as I mentioned elsewhere is that stats is really applied math. You do learn a lot of regurgitation-style stuff - formulas, proofs, blah blah, but it's all useless without applying it. Moreover, stats draws from so many different areas in math and requires analytical skills that are closer to many of the things scientists emphasize in learning to conduct studies and experiments. This makes it almost unsuitable to teach the more valuable parts of stats at lower levels because the students can't possibly be prepared. At best, I think you can teach some general things about stats and the mentality I described of being analytical and skeptical. Unfortunately, stats is just really hard for anyone to properly and comprehensively learn who isn't going to be able to invest a lot of time both learning pre-requisites and then all the different areas of stats. It's like learning to be a carpenter and only understanding how to work a hammer, but not a saw, measuring tape, or anything else.

baldfat 10y ago

Looking at Common Core anything besides old arcane way of math will never be accepted :(