I'm curious to know what the math problem was as well. Sometimes the problems are unsolveable to help kids learn to realize when they can't solve a problem, and to figure out what additional information they would need to solve it (an important critical thinking skill). It's also entirely possible there was an error in the worksheet, which has been happening ever since there were worksheets, long before common core. |
I 100% agree!!! I get folders full of worksheets. I ask about actual lessons and it sounds like they are brief and boring mostly with the occasional creative lesson thrown in. Usually over half the worksheets have not been checked by the teacher so I go over mistakes. Whatever happened to textbooks? At least with a text I could read the lesson myself and come up with a novel way to teach it to my child. There have been some great teachers too, but they just make the bad ones all the more unbearable. Is anything even being done to help the paper pushers and endless test-givers make learning more interesting. Is there any oversight beyond parents having to complain repeatedly. Usually it has to be about 10 parents who have expressed concern to the teacher and then if things don't improve, to the principal before anything is done. |
|
Posting again to share this awesome video of an Arkansas mom standing up to the local school board to say common core needs to go!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZEGijN_8R0 |
| Worksheets are a result of teaches and administration running scared on test scores. As long as those test scores are given so much weight, you will continue to see worksheets. Sadly, the test scores would be better if they spent their time teaching. |
I no longer have the worksheets, but I can tell you about what the problems were. One of them was multiple choice and there wasn't a correct answer provided in the answers. It was #+#= a, b, c, or d but none of them were the right answer! The other one was even more infuriating. It was a lesson in greater than, less than and equal to. The question asked you to find the tree that's length was less than this tree but greater than that tree and it had the names of the trees and their lengths on a table. It was super confusing for me, so when I determined there was no solution, I handed it to dh (he's an engineer, so he's pretty good at math) and he even looked at the stupid thing for five minutes and tried to explain this bs to our ds. |
So on the first one, there was a mistake on the worksheet? What does that have to do with the standards? Did you really never encounter an error in a textbook in all your years in school? As for the second one, without knowing about the problem, there's no way to know what's going on there. There does seem to a trend in the responses to common core, though, that people of our generation who could get through math with just memorization and no deeper understanding of the material are struggling to understand and help with their kids' homework, because the focus on so much more on that deeper understanding that the parents were never taught. It's very frustrating to the parents (and probably doesn't feel great to realize they aren't as good at math as they thought), but that doesn't mean our kids shouldn't learn more than we did. |
So there was an answer (that your DH was trying to explain) but you and your ds didn't understand it? Just trying to get how this correlates with common core. I have had the no correct answer on a worksheet thing happen. They don't get vetted the way books do, so I'm sure it happens a little more. Not a big deal, though, unless it was a common problem (has happened once in 2 years so far). |
Really, my dh who is an engineer isn't as good at math as he thought? Lol. No, and he thought this math problem was stupid and confusing too. |
There was no way to solve the problem. There was no answer. Common core sucks. Just admit that you love it. I'm not sure why though. |
You didn't say your husband didn't understand it, only that you didn't understand it when he tried to explain it. From what you described it actually doesn't sound that complicated, but perhaps there was something you were leaving out. |
|
|
I have to laugh. You are all obviously young people because common core is really how math was taught in the 50s and 60s. It actually works better because it teaches the relationships of numbers, beginning with the relationship to 10. It works the same way you use an abacus.
The way they taught math in the late 70's, 80's and 90's, and as far as I know into the 2000's was screwed up. That's when this country started to lose their advantage in math. Instead of complaining, educate yourselves. |
|
Your reading comprehension is a good argument in favor of new standards. |
This supports the article I read about how the average American adult is worse in math than their counterparts in many other countries, including some 2nd world countries. |