The way our children are being taught math in the schools is not working. When are the schools going to change math teaching back to the way prior generations of Americans learned math. The problem with the math currently being taught is that the teachers don't understand it. How can they be expected to teach what they don't understand when teaching is sharing what you know with those interested in learning.
My grandson attends 5th grade at Scwarting elementary school in the Plaindedge District. He could not understand how his teacher was teaching him how to multiply. He doesn't even have a math book. He comes home with dittos to do his homework. My daughter went to the school and his teacher was making him draw boxes to teach him about hundreds, tens and ones place. This is a child who has problems following steps since kindergarten. He's intelligent but has a learning handicap.
My son-in-law who learned math in Europe the same as I and my daughter did in the public schools here sat with him for hours going our the steps to multiply and check his answer. He finally understood it and went back to school to show his teacher what he had learned. A week later he comes to me for help with his math homework and tells me his teacher was absent. The substitute teacher did not teach in class the assignment he had for homework and I had to figure out from the example what he was supposed to do.
It was a multiplication problem but they wanted him to do the mulptiplication backwords. Instead of right to left and carrying. The problem was 486 * 75 =
Add all those answers together. My question is why?
The testing is timed. There is nothing wrong with slow reading. People who read slow comprehend more. Speed reading is a bunch of baloney.
Another issue is his spelling words. His teacher writes words on the board. The students pick 20 words. Everyone has different words. They have a study buddy but not one checks that the spelling of the words is correct so he writes and studies words that are mispelled and a lot of them are not words but two word phrases. You can't find definitions for them in the dictionary because they are not in the dictionary. They are in my grandson's textbooks who is in the 10th grade. He would like to know why his little brother is being assigned these words for spelling.
The 5th grader can't begin to comprehend the meaning of the words he's being told to memorize. It's nonsense.
No child left behind is becoming every child left behind. And when I think of the taxes we pay for this nonsense it drives me crazy. It's not just his class because his friend across the street who is in a different class has the same spelling words and math nonsense.
What are parents supposed to do? No wonder so much money is being spent with disasterous results. Our education system has become our enemy. Who is responsible for this mess?
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5th Grade math - 
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