Compacted math

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Its very subjective but unfortunately this is what 2.0 is all about now. Not sure why anyone surprised since kids at our school never received any regular assessments beyond teacher observation for years all the way up until compacted math.

Math instruction in MCPS is so horribly broken. Its really shocking considering how MCPS was once known for being a great school system for math. Now, its among the worst.

I didn't think much of the pre-2.0 math my pre-2.0 child had. My 2.0 child is getting much better math instruction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Is there a subjective element to the testing? My child said that she gets points for how she explains her answer verbally to the teacher.

Its very subjective but unfortunately this is what 2.0 is all about now. Not sure why anyone surprised since kids at our school never received any regular assessments beyond teacher observation for years all the way up until compacted math.

Math instruction in MCPS is so horribly broken. Its really shocking considering how MCPS was once known for being a great school system for math. Now, its among the worst.

I detect a hit of bitterness here. Did your kid not make compacted math? Many parent's whose kids didn't make HGC also feel shortchanged and that their kids should've made it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Is there a subjective element to the testing? My child said that she gets points for how she explains her answer verbally to the teacher.

Its very subjective but unfortunately this is what 2.0 is all about now. Not sure why anyone surprised since kids at our school never received any regular assessments beyond teacher observation for years all the way up until compacted math.

Math instruction in MCPS is so horribly broken. Its really shocking considering how MCPS was once known for being a great school system for math. Now, its among the worst.

I detect a hit of bitterness here. Did your kid not make compacted math? Many parent's whose kids didn't make HGC also feel shortchanged and that their kids should've made it.

oopsies.. that should be *hint* not *hit*.

[Anonymous]

No, my child is in compacted math. The system is still broken, such a waste.

[Anonymous]

In my experience, the parents with kids in compacted math are disgusted at MCPS math. Most send have been sending their kids to outside math instruction well before compacted math. The only parents not horrified by MCPS math are the ones that don't like math themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In my experience, the parents with kids in compacted math are disgusted at MCPS math. Most send have been sending their kids to outside math instruction well before compacted math. The only parents not horrified by MCPS math are the ones that don't like math themselves.

I like math, and I think that 2.0 math is an improvement.

[Anonymous]

I like math, and I think that 2.0 math is an improvement.

Well, you are an idiot.

[Anonymous]

The only parents at our school who think 2.0 math is an improvement are the dumbest ones. Its a glaringly obvious split. The STEM parent seem to hate it the most but don't struggle to understand how to do it. They teach at home or send their kids to outside math instruction. In 3-5th grade, the dumb parents who loved the deeper number nonsense of K-2 are completely lost and have no idea how to help their kids who now have no math skills coming out of 3 years of nothing.

[Anonymous]

Somehow I'm finding this "anybody who disagrees with me is an ignorant fool" argument unpersuasive.

[Anonymous]

I've only encountered two parents who liked the new math curriculum. They happen to be very ditzy. Ironically, they don't like it much now as their kids are having a hard time with math. Perhaps its a coincidence but dislike for math is near universal at our school for the rest of the community. I'm friends with several excellent teachers. They don't like it either but for different reasons than the parents.

Parents that don't like 2.0 focus on how easy it is in the early grades. They teach at home or send kids to math classes. This obscures the real problems in 2.0.

The biggest problem that I see is the lack organization and development of calculation and fluency. Young kids need to build a strong foundation. The problems show up in upper elementary after years of not learning basic math facts. Since the kids don't know their basic tables, their performance is really erratic. In 2.0 they spend all their time learning 4 ways to solve a basic problem. This isn't helpful. You really can't do more complex math if you have to decompose to know 4 X 7 =28. The kids end up needing way too many steps and introduce calculation errors for all the decomposing of basic facts to get to the next step. This confuses them and they miss the whole concept of the more complex problem. The teachers are seeing these problems with kids who don't have outside math classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The biggest problem that I see is the lack organization and development of calculation and fluency. Young kids need to build a strong foundation. The problems show up in upper elementary after years of not learning basic math facts. Since the kids don't know their basic tables, their performance is really erratic. In 2.0 they spend all their time learning 4 ways to solve a basic problem. This isn't helpful. You really can't do more complex math if you have to decompose to know 4 X 7 =28. The kids end up needing way too many steps and introduce calculation errors for all the decomposing of basic facts to get to the next step. This confuses them and they miss the whole concept of the more complex problem. The teachers are seeing these problems with kids who don't have outside math classes.

This may be true at your child's school, but it is not true at my child's school. My third grader's class has worked on math facts, in class, since first grade. In contrast, for my older child, we were told that it was the parents' responsibility to work with their children at home on math facts.

[Anonymous]

My pre 2.0 kids did not math fact drilling in the class-- we were supposed to do that at home. Now in 2.0 my kids have been doing math fact drills every year.

[Anonymous]

If you really have made sure that your child knows their math tables addition, subtraction, multiplication and division up to 12 then good for you. In the new curriculum, there is very little indication that kids don't know their tables until they run into problems. The parents see a P on everything and think their kid knows their math facts. The 2.0 assessments are heavily focused on the 2.0 strategies not foundational math skills. A child will present that he knows 4X7=28 because he is expected to show work that breaks it into 2X7 = 14 and 2X7= 14, 14+14=28. The teacher marks him as proficient in multiplication. Later on, the kid really doesn't know that 4X7=28. Parents have no idea. Teacher doesn't know either because she doesn't teach 4th or 5th grade math. In 5th grade, he can only quickly multiply by 2, 3, 5 and maybe 4 so he needs to decompose but there are so many other steps and larger numbers in the problem he is solving that he makes more mistakes.

In 2.0, its even more important to make sure your child knows math facts and traditional math from practice at home then in the previous curriculum.

[Anonymous]

In the previous curriculum the unit tests would catch lack of math fluency. 2.0 obscures it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've only encountered two parents who liked the new math curriculum. They happen to be very ditzy. Ironically, they don't like it much now as their kids are having a hard time with math. Perhaps its a coincidence but dislike for math is near universal at our school for the rest of the community. I'm friends with several excellent teachers. They don't like it either but for different reasons than the parents.

Parents that don't like 2.0 focus on how easy it is in the early grades. They teach at home or send kids to math classes. This obscures the real problems in 2.0.

The biggest problem that I see is the lack organization and development of calculation and fluency. Young kids need to build a strong foundation. The problems show up in upper elementary after years of not learning basic math facts. Since the kids don't know their basic tables, their performance is really erratic. In 2.0 they spend all their time learning 4 ways to solve a basic problem. This isn't helpful. You really can't do more complex math if you have to decompose to know 4 X 7 =28. The kids end up needing way too many steps and introduce calculation errors for all the decomposing of basic facts to get to the next step. This confuses them and they miss the whole concept of the more complex problem. The teachers are seeing these problems with kids who don't have outside math classes.

I hear this again and again, but my DC memorized the multiplication table in 3rd grade *in class* (with practices at home), now in compacted math, and never had math classes outside of school.

I'm a math person, so is my DH, both in a STEM field. I think parts of 2.0 math is good, others not so much. I don't like how they spend so much time on a particular type of math problem, but I know that not all kids learn at the same rate. I do like how they are learning how to add using base 10 and the emphasis on place value. It is frustrating to me when I see my 4th grader taking too long doing multi-digit multiplication. I do like, however, how they are learning *why* they carry the number over when doing this type of multiplication vs. how we learned it (by rote with no explanation as to why it was done this way). I just wish they wouldn't so much time on it.