4 ms·

This involves paying teachers paying more and treating them with respect? Nah, lets have endless conversations about how whether we should not learn math at all

This involves paying teachers paying more and treating them with respect? Nah, lets have endless conversations about how whether we should not learn math at all! That issue is highly political though. Even when setting aside the issue of selling to voters a pay raise for teachers. Good math teachers are specialists with a math education. To attract them to teaching you’re going to have to pay them more than other teachers. How do you sell that, politically, to teachers’ unions? There’s a lot of cognitive dissonance going on with non-specialist teachers teaching math. They’re teaching bad habits and passing on their own math anxiety to students but if you confront them about it they get very defensive and start talking about school funding and textbooks and materials and computers. The truth is: that’s all bunk. Third world countries are better at teaching math. They don’t get distracted with computers and they don’t waste time and money redesigning the curriculum and printing new textbooks all the time. They teach math in the old, straightforward style and emphasize practice.

pj_mukh 4y ago
No point comparing ourselves to the third world. The American middle-class has different expectations (of pay, of lifestyle, of cultural occupational conditions) than the third world, we just have to accept that. And FWIW, having had gone to a "third world" school, those teachers are great at teaching people to do well on tests, not to think critically. Paying english teachers less also means you get bad english teachers that are bad at teaching critical reading (which..yikes!), so I don't really see the point of that pay discrimination. I would absolutely advocate for removing administrative bloat, but we should be recruiting teachers like tech workers.
- chongli 4y ago
  Paying english teachers less also means you get bad english teachers that are bad at teaching critical reading (which..yikes!), so I don't really see the point of that pay discrimination. I haven't seen any evidence that any particular teaching method delivers tangible improvements in critical thinking skills over the school term. Do you know of any? It's important to measure skills at the beginning and end of a term (and a followup years later) in order to show improvements at the individual level. Otherwise you risk selecting for students' prior ability.
  - pj_mukh 4y ago
    It maybe worth it to talk about universally superior teaching methods but as far as I can tell no teaching method can survive a teacher not caring. I understand this is not true for all professions. In manufacturing you can write a handbook (Just follow steps 1 thru n) and any min-wage worker will give good results as long as they follow those steps. As far as I know, professions like teaching, nursing etc. don't work that way. I personally know about 3 teachers who genuinely cared about their students but could not survive on teacher salaries (2 are now real estate agents and miss their kids :/).

pj_mukh 4y ago

No point comparing ourselves to the third world. The American middle-class has different expectations (of pay, of lifestyle, of cultural occupational conditions) than the third world, we just have to accept that. And FWIW, having had gone to a "third world" school, those teachers are great at teaching people to do well on tests, not to think critically. Paying english teachers less also means you get bad english teachers that are bad at teaching critical reading (which..yikes!), so I don't really see the point of that pay discrimination. I would absolutely advocate for removing administrative bloat, but we should be recruiting teachers like tech workers.

chongli 4y ago
Paying english teachers less also means you get bad english teachers that are bad at teaching critical reading (which..yikes!), so I don't really see the point of that pay discrimination. I haven't seen any evidence that any particular teaching method delivers tangible improvements in critical thinking skills over the school term. Do you know of any? It's important to measure skills at the beginning and end of a term (and a followup years later) in order to show improvements at the individual level. Otherwise you risk selecting for students' prior ability.
- pj_mukh 4y ago
  It maybe worth it to talk about universally superior teaching methods but as far as I can tell no teaching method can survive a teacher not caring. I understand this is not true for all professions. In manufacturing you can write a handbook (Just follow steps 1 thru n) and any min-wage worker will give good results as long as they follow those steps. As far as I know, professions like teaching, nursing etc. don't work that way. I personally know about 3 teachers who genuinely cared about their students but could not survive on teacher salaries (2 are now real estate agents and miss their kids :/).