"Anyone remember this old Isaac Asimov story?"

Considering that the story was written in the 50s, Asimov must have had amazing predictive powers and anticipated the state of affairs to be brought on by NCTM and its myriad myrmidons.

The story can be read here: http://downlode.org/etext/power.html

-- CharlesH - 04 Sep 2006

Anyone remember this old Isacc Asimov story?

Quote from Amazon review:

In "The Feeling of Power," Asimov tells us of a scientist who is actually capable of doing simple math problems on paper (gasp!), without the aid of a computer (!), and how the military minds of that distant century make use of these newfound skills.

-- SusanJ - 04 Sep 2006

Having looked at a lot of the curriculum mapping materials at the State's website, I can say with some confidence that the "increasingly irrelevant skils" are pretty much everything that requires kids to compute math problems accurately and efficiently. Long, convoluted explanations by kids in their own words are "in", even if they reach the wrong answers.

-- LynnGuelzow - 04 Sep 2006

In addition, time that is no longer spent on increasingly irrelevant skills

So I take it that teachers, the ones who were not required to take algebra to get their education degree, will then decide which skills are "irrelevent."

-- SusanS - 04 Sep 2006

Hi Catherine,

Did you see this post on KDeRosa^?'s blog?

At the bottom a school is making changes to get higher scores on the test results. That it is changing is good, but what the changes imply about what was going on before is shocking.

"and the district has looked at individual students' performance to see who needs help so they can get it this school year."

The chorus program was folded into music class so that students no longer missed math or reading to participate.

So, obviously before NCLB this school was not only ignoring individual students' performance, but also letting kids who were poor readers or poor at maths skip those classes to sing.

Talk about weird priorities.

-- TracyW - 03 Sep 2006

In addition, time that is no longer spent on increasingly irrelevant skills – particularly those done most often with a calculator – frees up valuable minutes and hours ...

Which they are going to need, because they haven't the foundation they'll need to do estimation, algebraic reasoning, and problem solving.

-- CarolynJohnston - 03 Sep 2006

Advice from the State of Connecticut to elementary math teachers (or -- if the state test is fuzzy, then you need never realize kids haven't learned math -- until they get to college):

Strategy 9: Omit What Is No Longer Important

A significant amount of time and energy is expended by teachers and students on skills considered less important by national and state standards and not even assessed on the CMT, the Connecticut Academic Performance Test (CAPT) or the SAT. District mathematics curriculums must become more focused on what is truly valued and teachers must give themselves and each other permission to skip textbook pages that no longer serve useful purposes. In addition, time that is no longer spent on increasingly irrelevant skills – particularly those done most often with a calculator – frees up valuable minutes and hours for increasingly important skills like estimation, algebraic reasoning and problem solving. So carefully review what is NOT assessed on the CMT – particularly complex, multidigit computation – and redirect what is taught to focus on those skills and concepts that have lasting value and that ARE assessed.

In other words, the State has advised teachers to stop teaching long division, operations with decimals and fractions, and other time consuming, but now apparently, irrelevant tasks.

-- LynnGuelzow - 03 Sep 2006

Somebody please tell me why a 7th grader needs anonymity?

I'm reminded of when the 12 year old Drew Barrymore had to go into detox to get clean and sober from cocaine. Some magazine had interviewed her mother about it, who said, "I didn't know it was getting so bad. She was upset all the time. She seemed like she needed her space, so I gave it to her."

-- CarolynJohnston - 03 Sep 2006

the bad gets normal

I just noticed this passage in the middle of an article on parents helping with middle school homework:

Brainfuse.com also offers online tutor help, primarily to schools through the federal No Child Left Behind legislation. If a school has failed to make adequate progress under the law for two or more years, the school can choose from a state-approved tutoring company, with Brainfuse among them, said Francesco Lecciso, director for the company.

Brainfuse now has contracts with school districts in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York and other smaller districts, as well the Queens public library system.

“There’s clearly times students need a face-to-face tutor, but sometimes he needs anonymity,” Mr. Lecciso said. “Online, a student might be more willing to ask the same question eight times in a row, or to admit he doesn’t know how to do long division even though he’s in 7th grade.”

source:
If You Can Click a Mouse You Can Help on Homework