About two weeks ago, a post titled “Singapore Math Is ‘Our Dirty Little Secret’” appeared on the Core Knowledge blog. It criticized the New York Times article about Singapore Math that appeared on October 1. Apparently, the author believes that the poor state of math education in the US is due to what he calls “reform math.” This ignores an entire generation of math-phobic adults who learned math through “traditional” methods, and most likely instigated the reform movement due to their dissatisfaction with those methods. While the curricula based purely on constructivist approaches have their limitations, the idea that Singapore…
-
-
My first trip to NCTM is over, and I’m glad I went. Although the setup had a few glitches, like an LCD projector that didn’t want to project from my laptop, my presentation on problem solving using model drawing went well, with close to 180 participants. Many of them came back to the booth, interested in further learning, and some bought books and materials or inquired about future opportunities to develop this skill. I’m really pleased about this, because it means more children may be better equipped to enjoy and understand math. The booth was busy the whole day, and…
-
After a long day of arriving and helping to set up the SDE booth, I had a little time to look around the NCTM bookstore. (NCTM, in case you don’t know, is the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and the host of this conference.) There were some interesting books, but the one I just HAD to buy was Math Jokes 4 Mathy Folks by G. Patrick Vennebush. How could I resist? It shows what a math geek I am that I was laughing out loud while reading some of the jokes. This will be a great resource for any…
-
I’m on my way to participate in the NCTM Regional conference in Baltimore, Maryland. My presentation is first thing tomorrow morning, and it will be on the topic of Singapore Math model drawing. The session is 75 minutes long, enough for a taste of several types of model drawing. Hopefully the participants will come away with some understanding of the power of model drawing and will be able to put it to use. If you are there, come by and see me after the presentation, from 11:00 AM on, at booth 614, with SDE!
-
Bill Jackson, the Scarsdale Singapore Math coach who is making waves nationwide, wrote an interesting series for The Daily Riff. The first article lays out how he got interested in Singapore Math. Here is a quote from his experience working with Japanese math teachers: When I began working with the Japanese teachers, I soon realized three important reasons why they were such good math teachers: (1) They had a high level of math content knowledge. In fact, I felt that their first grade teachers knew more about math than I did as an 8th grade teacher! (2) They used thin,…
-
A new reality show called Teach premiered on A&E on October 1. It follows Tony Danza as he enters the teaching profession as a high school literature teacher, with no prior teacher training. I was fully prepared to dislike this program, as the preview indicated it would be another feel-good show about a former actor getting a chance to make a difference in young people’s lives. Why, I thought, aren’t they featuring an excellent non-celebrity teacher? But I was pleasantly surprised. Teaching is a hard profession. It’s even harder if you want to be good or excellent at it. The…
-
Following on from last Friday’s New York Times article, the NY Times blogs ran a brief follow-up article titled, “A Slower Approach to Math,” with the opportunity to add your own comments to it. There were some pretty interesting thoughts there, which inspired me to add the following comment: As a teacher experienced in teaching Singapore Math and training other teachers to use it, I am constantly learning about the state of education around our country, especially in math. I see Singapore Math has many strengths as a curriculum and approach, and more of these are being adopted into our…
-
Are you looking for ideas about how to engage students in math, or show them how it applies to the real world? Here is a fun one for sports lovers. John Roach at msnbc.com recently published an article called “The Math and Science of Baseball.” It outlines various ways in which math and science have been applied to the sport. We all know about batting averages, but did you know scientists have analyzed everything from how likely it is that the best team will win with the current number of games vs. the ideal number of games per season, that…
-
Good news! The virtual classroom for our awesome YWP program is up and running. As soon as participants are fully signed up, they will receive login information. I have received a number of inquiries about the location of the program. The answer is: it’s up to us! Some people are north, some are south, some are middle… we will make it work, even if I travel a couple of times a week. Carpooling can help too. Remember, if you want to facilitate this, we would love your help. Let us know if you have good meeting places, and what dates…
-
Last Friday, this New York times article about Singapore Math appeared. The premise of the beginning of the article is that by studying one number at a time slowly, students learn more thoroughly and therefore build a better mathematical foundation. This is true, even if it is an oversimplification of the curriculum. Here is a quote from the article: Principals and teachers say that slowing down the learning process gives students a solid math foundation upon which to build increasingly complex skills, and makes it less likely that they will forget and have to be retaught the same thing in…
