EPTIs Algebra Necessary? - Page 26
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Silvanel
Poland4768 Posts
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Mystgun
Hong Kong311 Posts
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Dr_Strange
United States80 Posts
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iiGreetings
Canada563 Posts
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Arghmyliver
United States1079 Posts
On July 30 2012 02:08 corpuscle wrote: I tutored Algebra for the second semester of this year, and every single kid in the class that sought extra help passed, including some that were failing or very close to failing when I got there. The way math is taught doesn't make sense to a lot of people, and that's a failing of the system, not the students or the subject matter. I know my evidence is somewhat anecdotal, but from my experience, there's simply no excuse for a student that has the commensurate intelligence to pass all of their other classes to fail math. It's not some mysterious enigmatic field that only the privileged few can and should understand, it's a very basic field. It doesn't surprise me in the least, by the way, that the author of the article is in the social sciences. edit: I should clarify. With the way your typical math class is taught, it's very much understandable and expected to have a lot of kids failing. Math is hard for a lot of people, and there needs to be more support and individual attention in math and science classes (and education as a whole), but that's an issue of lack of resources, and is in no way an excuse to make algebra an elective. I agree - its not the subject matter, its the medium. They way schools are structured in general is completely wrong for modern society. We need to reform the way we teach, not what we teach. | ||
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theHubble
United States30 Posts
For example: Last year in my AlgebraII/Trig class I was approached with a word problem having something to do with the relationship of the size of an airplane in relation ship of how much the plan could carry in weight. The values were but on a graph and it was expressed with an equation of x^4+3x^3... or something like that. Looking at it I realized I had no idea what that meant. I had no connection of how a bunch of x's raised to some power would eventually give me an answer of how much weight a plane could carry. A lot of the word problems in math classes aren't really real-life situations and don't give you a deeper understanding of why you would need to know the topic. Pretty much all it is is a practice problem hidden in a jumble of words where a bunch of random numbers are letters are slapped in your face and their supposed to represent some real-life event where there is no explanation of the relationship between them. But anyway I continued on and I and i graphed all the points and connected the dots and stuff. Then I shaded in all the parts of the graph that would have made for an answer and I looked at it and realized that one area that was shaded represented a situation where the plane had no length. I went up and asked my teacher, and older lady who had worked at JPL and had majored in physics in her younger days, "Why would this ever make sense that the plane would have no length? Why does the mathematics say that is possible?" she replied with, "I don't really know this isn't the best example." So naturally I said "Well what is this really used for then?" "I don't really know." What's worse than that is that I can guarantee that kid's in lower level classes than I am don't give two shits about what their learning could actually do for them. All they do is sit there and try to memorize things. There were plenty of times in chemistry where I would sit there and look at it and ask "well why is it exactly that way?" or "What makes it so uniform?" When the teacher would have to stop and go into some detail, I really felt like i was learning some real chemisty and how shit really works while plenty of the other kids were upset because i was wasting so much time. I think it's bull shit that school's can't slow down enough for people to really grasp what's important. Its stupid that schools are so locked into state standards and other requirements that they can't fully teach what is most important and have to move on before some things are fully learned. I don't understand why say a geometry teacher can't have time to take the students out and have them try to figure out how tall the building is using rulers and protractors or try to figure out how to accurately estimate how many m&m's are really in that jar. Dumb little experiments like these are pretty much possible for all classes and if the kid's are out there applying the skills they have learned to some real word objects I think that this would greatly improve the understanding of most skills taught in school. | ||
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...what
England94 Posts
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Reborn8u
United States1761 Posts
I had 3 years of pre algebra and 2 years of algebra. I made my teachers aware of the fact and they didn't care whatsoever. The real pain for me was having to master each specific teachers "right way" of doing things. They all taught only 1 method for most things and expected that method to be the only one used for their assignments (show your work was always mandatory) I often would achieve the right answers and get the problem marked as wrong because I didn't use the desired method or skipped a step they deemed necessary. Very frustrating. I think in all basic subjects (math, history, reading, and science) this is a huge issue, students should be taught in a steady stream, doing some review and building a base of knowledge that makes more advanced subjects come easier. The way I was taught was completely random and I feel my school system failed me as a student. | ||
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Servius_Fulvius
United States947 Posts
On July 30 2012 01:38 Colour wrote: What the hell are they thinking? Algebra is like basic logic skills. If people can't do this I don't feel like they should be let out into the world with a high school diploma... The article makes a decent argument that a minority of high school graduates need the skills that algebra teaches them. Even with the current fail-rate, US society hasn't collapsed, so it doesn't exactly follow that the world is a worse place if they didn't know it in the first place. The crux of algebra is "finding an unknown variable from a known expression", which, while logical, is far from teaching a set of logic skills. From my own experiences volunteering to tutor math and science, the biggest problem is a lack of practice, and an incompatibility with different learning styles: 1). Some people just "get" algebra; others have to work very hard. I just finished my Master's thesis for Chemical Engineering, but when I was in 9th grade I needed to put in a lot of time and effort to understand basic algebra. I got a solid B in a non-honor's level class. Looking back, I didn't practice nearly enough. Math proficiency is like training yourself in a sport: you need to practice consistently . Since there is a tendency to avoid subjects that are hard coupled with the US sentiment that failing math is socially acceptable, it's no wonder high school students blow it off. 2). Math and science books are usually written in a style that caters to sequential learners and "thinkers". A LOT of STEM majors in college learn this way. Unfortunately, gloabal learners, "feelers", "sensors", "perceivers", etc do not learn these classes easily. It takes a lot of effort. Educators are becoming better at incorporating techniques that help other learning styles and including active learning exercises, but progress is slow and the paradigm is FAR from shifted. I understand the author of the article thinks that removing algebra will increase graduation rates, but I think that it will do more harm than good. The whole point of secondary education is to prepare us for the real world. Even though 10% of high school graduates need algebra for their future, why should education only cater to the majority? Don't additional proficiencies produce better-rounded students? Can't you make the same argument about history courses, gym, fine arts, and almost every other subject? If we're specifically catering to real world applications, wouldn't that make high school a trade school? | ||
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Campitor
36 Posts
And most urban class room time is roughly 40 minutes to 1 hour depending on the school you attend. All you need is 1 misbehaving student to suck up 20 minutes of that class time and suddenly everyone's math future is jeapordized. Or worst yet a teacher who doesn't know how to effectively communicate mathematical principles dooms their students to less than average performance in future math classes. Group students by mathematical aptitude and tailor the course as needed. Get rid of tenure and allow ineffective teachers to be fired. Pay teachers more so you attract better talent. Segregate repeatedly disruptive students into a basic curriculum and let them graduate with a GED, or steer them towards a vocational class such as plumbing, electricity, etc. Increase the school day and shorten the summer vacation. Doing the above will improve all math scores and we will be arguing about something other than eliminating Algebra. | ||
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Poffel
471 Posts
Polemics aside, what's the deal with knowledge that isn't "useful"? It's not that one's brain would suddenly be full, and in order to learn something new one had to forget their phone number or something like that... Isn't it kind of nice that people have the opportunity to learn stuff, even if it's only for academic exercise? In other words, in what way would not learning anything be better than learning it? | ||
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Xialos
Canada508 Posts
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corpuscle
United States1967 Posts
On July 30 2012 02:43 Xialos wrote: are we talking about linear algebra ? or basic algebra like 4 + x² = 20 Basic algebra. Linear generally isn't taught until college, unless the student's on some special track. | ||
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sheaRZerg
United States613 Posts
Trigonometry, maybe, most people could do without. | ||
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Badboyrune
Sweden2247 Posts
On July 30 2012 00:39 shadowy wrote: In my own opinion, learning math teaches us abstractive thinking. Being able to manipulate with abstractive ideas and applying them to different situations (which might or might not be abstractive as well) is the only thing, that separates us from the animals. Put it another way - abstractive thinking is the sole tool we use as species to progress. Hence, teaching math is the only way for us to advance and survive as species. Could teaching higher provisions of math be targeted better? I am absolutely positive it can. Do we have to stop teaching math - to myself the answer can be only one - we shouldn't. --- I have graduated with math and never really had to use in work/real life. I would have made it through in life with simple 5 grade stuff, but the skills I learned I find irreplaceable. This pretty much sums up the way I think of why math is being taught in schools. After a certain point (which comes quite early) real life application stops being the main point of the math you are being taught. Instead what you are learning is abstract and logical thinking as well as a good bunch of problem solving. All of which is incredibly useful for so many things in life, and I don't think you can be taught any of those things as effectively in any other class than math. Therefore I think that even if practical applications of many things you are taught are relatively few, unless you want to continue studying science, I still think math is incredibly important. To be honest I think that the main problem is the way math is taught, which at least in Sweden is incredibly dull and feels rather outdated. Very little is done to try to make it seem either exciting, interesting or useful. Instead it's just drone like repetition of exercises that is utterly uninspiring unless you have a fascination with numbers, which many don't. Just saying that 'kids are bad at math' feels like a odd conclusion. Have kids become more stupid? Hardly. However cultures have changed and I think how math is taught has changed quite little. I think 'we are bad at teaching kids math' is probably a more likely conclusion. | ||
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Bronyaur
United States20 Posts
On July 30 2012 02:30 Servius_Fulvius wrote: I understand the author of the article thinks that removing algebra will increase graduation rates, but I think that it will do more harm than good. The whole point of secondary education is to prepare us for the real world. Even though 10% of high school graduates need algebra for their future, why should education only cater to the majority? Don't additional proficiencies produce better-rounded students? Can't you make the same argument about history courses, gym, fine arts, and almost every other subject? If we're specifically catering to real world applications, wouldn't that make high school a trade school? Very good point. The reasoning "kids are failing too much so we should make it easier" is possibly the worst conclusion I have heard in a long time. Why is this an issue now? How long has algebra been part of the standard cirriculum? Have high failing rates always been a problem? He even mentions Canada and Korea as being exceptions. Why is that? Is it possible that the problem with failing rates isn't with algebra, but with the students or the education platform as a whole? I suggest fixing the real source of the problem first before looking at an alternative to algebra (although I do support that as well). | ||
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alexanderzero
United States659 Posts
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wswordsmen
United States987 Posts
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Xialos
Canada508 Posts
On July 30 2012 02:44 corpuscle wrote: Basic algebra. Linear generally isn't taught until college, unless the student's on some special track. well lol... basic algebra is really simple... dunno what to say. It's just basic logic, like really basic. | ||
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david0925
212 Posts
Unless you plan on doing something monotonous like flipping burgers for the rest of your life, which is fine if that is your decision. | ||
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