4 ms·

"Math certainly is incomprehensible to many students, but from where I sit, poor teaching is often the reason." I'll paraphrase what I said in the last thread:

"Math certainly is incomprehensible to many students, but from where I sit, poor teaching is often the reason." I'll paraphrase what I said in the last thread: algebra isn't harder than other subjects, it's more objective. Therefore, it tends to make educational fraud more visible. People rarely fail algebra and succeed in other subjects; they fail in all subjects and algebra is the only one where it can't be ignored any longer.

adharmad 14y ago
Can't upvote you high enough! Same can be said about any subject, mastering of which requires applying it to problems with objective answers. (Physics, Geometry...)
dinkumthinkum 14y ago
Exactly, many of these students are doing very poorly in their other subjects (not all obviously, but we don't destroy the educational system over outliers) but are just being passed along. High school algebra is pretty basic, OK. I think we all know that if we are honest. In some ways, it's just too simplistic, many other nations would agree wholeheartedly. Students that are failing these classes, I think, for the most part, have other things going on, perhaps other educational deficiencies, problems at home (even if it is just a bad study atmosphere), unable to prioritize, caving into other pressures of just giving up, etc. Parents have to be engaged in education. It's much harder without that. I suspect without parental engagement, those that succeed are really motivated self-starters and autodidacts, outliers.
- saraid216 14y ago
  > I suspect without parental engagement, those that succeed are really motivated self-starters and autodidacts, outliers. There's a fourth category: natural talent, which carries you so far without real effort but no further. Still an outlier, though.
tkahn6 14y ago
It may be more objective but it's not wholly different than how other subjects are taught. You're still memorizing a bunch of different facts (how to graph, how to change base of a logarithm, etc.). It's not like high school algebra actually gets into the underlying mathematics of the operations and why they happen to work specifically as they do on real numbers.
mrxd 14y ago
In the humanities, you are taught how to understand what people are trying to do with language, so I can't help reading your comment from that perspective. You say people rarely fail algebra and succeed at other subjects. To put that another way, let's assume that there are four sets. Set A consists of a group of people who are successful at one or more subjects, and Set B consists of people who are successful at no subjects. Set C consists of people who are good at math, and Set D consists of everyone else. Your statement implies that, for the most part, A = C and B = D. Thus you seem to be arguing that excellence at math is the sine qua non of an educated person -- it is a defining characteristic. What might you be trying to do with this line of reasoning? It seems fair to assume that you yourself are skilled at math, so really you are making a claim about yourself and other people who are similar to you. Your model of an educated person is based on yourself. In society, educated people are people whose judgments should be trusted and listened to, so we can conclude that the purpose of your argument is to try to get those benefits for yourself and people like you. Conversely, we can also conclude that you are trying to have those benefits removed from people who are different from you.
- einhverfr 14y ago
  Exactly. I have a liberal arts degree and studied math basically only through first year calculus. The strange thing is, compared to most people around me, I am relatively skilled at math. I can do algebra, some calculus perhaps at least pulling some estimates of integrals and derivatives, but my real love is in humanities. The reason why algebra is important has nothing to do with the GP's idea that it is the most objective of studies. Algebra is useful. That's it. People who know basics of algebra can use it constantly. I could see replacing geometry with a deductive logic class since that's all one studies with HS geometry anyway. I could see teaching less plane trig and more spherical trig too (I tried to teach myself spherical trig in order to better follow some writings of Ptolomy and others, and failed). But these aren't going to happen. But if you don't know algebra these doors are all closed.
  - dinkumthinkum 14y ago
    What I think the GP is getting at is that it may not be the case that these students are really that stellar at the other subjects that are failing algebra. It's just easier to get passed along. A teacher can more easily allowing gibberish to pass for an analysis of The Great Gatsby than let pass someone's completely wrong attempt at solving a linear equation. It happens. Everyone knows it; it's not a controversial thing.

adharmad 14y ago

Can't upvote you high enough! Same can be said about any subject, mastering of which requires applying it to problems with objective answers. (Physics, Geometry...)

dinkumthinkum 14y ago

Exactly, many of these students are doing very poorly in their other subjects (not all obviously, but we don't destroy the educational system over outliers) but are just being passed along. High school algebra is pretty basic, OK. I think we all know that if we are honest. In some ways, it's just too simplistic, many other nations would agree wholeheartedly. Students that are failing these classes, I think, for the most part, have other things going on, perhaps other educational deficiencies, problems at home (even if it is just a bad study atmosphere), unable to prioritize, caving into other pressures of just giving up, etc. Parents have to be engaged in education. It's much harder without that. I suspect without parental engagement, those that succeed are really motivated self-starters and autodidacts, outliers.

saraid216 14y ago
> I suspect without parental engagement, those that succeed are really motivated self-starters and autodidacts, outliers. There's a fourth category: natural talent, which carries you so far without real effort but no further. Still an outlier, though.

tkahn6 14y ago

It may be more objective but it's not wholly different than how other subjects are taught. You're still memorizing a bunch of different facts (how to graph, how to change base of a logarithm, etc.). It's not like high school algebra actually gets into the underlying mathematics of the operations and why they happen to work specifically as they do on real numbers.

mrxd 14y ago

In the humanities, you are taught how to understand what people are trying to do with language, so I can't help reading your comment from that perspective. You say people rarely fail algebra and succeed at other subjects. To put that another way, let's assume that there are four sets. Set A consists of a group of people who are successful at one or more subjects, and Set B consists of people who are successful at no subjects. Set C consists of people who are good at math, and Set D consists of everyone else. Your statement implies that, for the most part, A = C and B = D. Thus you seem to be arguing that excellence at math is the sine qua non of an educated person -- it is a defining characteristic. What might you be trying to do with this line of reasoning? It seems fair to assume that you yourself are skilled at math, so really you are making a claim about yourself and other people who are similar to you. Your model of an educated person is based on yourself. In society, educated people are people whose judgments should be trusted and listened to, so we can conclude that the purpose of your argument is to try to get those benefits for yourself and people like you. Conversely, we can also conclude that you are trying to have those benefits removed from people who are different from you.

einhverfr 14y ago
Exactly. I have a liberal arts degree and studied math basically only through first year calculus. The strange thing is, compared to most people around me, I am relatively skilled at math. I can do algebra, some calculus perhaps at least pulling some estimates of integrals and derivatives, but my real love is in humanities. The reason why algebra is important has nothing to do with the GP's idea that it is the most objective of studies. Algebra is useful. That's it. People who know basics of algebra can use it constantly. I could see replacing geometry with a deductive logic class since that's all one studies with HS geometry anyway. I could see teaching less plane trig and more spherical trig too (I tried to teach myself spherical trig in order to better follow some writings of Ptolomy and others, and failed). But these aren't going to happen. But if you don't know algebra these doors are all closed.
- dinkumthinkum 14y ago
  What I think the GP is getting at is that it may not be the case that these students are really that stellar at the other subjects that are failing algebra. It's just easier to get passed along. A teacher can more easily allowing gibberish to pass for an analysis of The Great Gatsby than let pass someone's completely wrong attempt at solving a linear equation. It happens. Everyone knows it; it's not a controversial thing.