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There are so many hours in the day. Either you argue that graph theory is more important than the other topics (which?) or you acknowledge that graph theory is
by gohrt 12y ago
There are so many hours in the day.
Either you argue that graph theory is more important than the other topics (which?) or you acknowledge that graph theory is an enrichment topic for some students who learn the core material faster or devote more time to math study.
It is true that Common Core lacks "enrichment" -- by defining a minimum standard, it doesn't specify what to do with student with more capacity to learn. But that's left to individual students, teachers, and schools, not incompatible.
If a teacher can teach their students 7G math standards in 6 months of the year, the teacher has plenty of class time for other topics.
- j2kun 12y agoI don't want to argue that graph theory is more important (though I could list which topics I think it's more important than). Rather I want to argue that, partially because primary and secondary school educators don't have so many years of preconceptions about the right way to teach the subject, it can do a better job building the underlying skills we want to teach students in teaching them math. We don't teach math because we want students to know facts (the correct answer to "What's the derivative of arccsc(x^2)?" is almost always "who cares?"). I certainly don't think that basic graph theory should be reserved for "advanced students." This second grade experiment shows that it's accessible to everyone.