No doing well with Common Core, but we'll with Singapore math

[Anonymous]

These threads always drive home for me how much we need higher math standards, whether CC or otherwise. A generation of parents who, for the most part, barely understand math, and yet still want their kids to learn it just like they did.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These threads always drive home for me how much we need higher math standards, whether CC or otherwise. A generation of parents who, for the most part, barely understand math, and yet still want their kids to learn it just like they did.

Barely understand? I'm computer scientist. Do you know the level of math knowledge that requires? Do you know how I'm able to do it? Because I had a strong math foundation at school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If I were older than 9 doing math this way, I might agree. But not for a 6/7 yr old. BTW, I am in IT, and when I try to explain to my ES kids what I do for a living, my explanation is long, much longer than how I would explain it to an adult. Why? Because young kids don't understand much about computers or business, just like they have limited exposure to number sense.

This is not how math works. Math is all about simplification. You're not teaching the right principles from the start.

I gather you don't have older kids? I also have a 5th grader. They use the old fashioned algorithms now to do computation. They do learn to use the most efficient way by 4th or 5th grade. Look, I do understand your frustration. I am Asian, math person, in IT. My older DC was a CC math guinea pig at the start of 2nd grade in our school district. I couldn't understand why DC was learning math that way. Seemed ridiculous. I had similar opinions as you. Both my DC's had the same 2nd grade teacher. Between this older DC and my younger DC (now in 2nd grade), it looks like they made some changes to the math worksheets. They seem a bit better. I totally get what they are trying to teach young ES kids now about number sense.

BTW, older DC is now in an accelerated math program at school.

I don't know what school district you are in, but it seems to me that some districts, and even school by school (maybe even teacher by teacher) have different types of math worksheets. Some are better than others.

Your DC is in 1st grade. Again, I don't know what school district you are in, but I am in mcps and on-grade math track will have most kids taking Calculus by 12th grade, with advanced kids taking it in 11th.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These threads always drive home for me how much we need higher math standards, whether CC or otherwise. A generation of parents who, for the most part, barely understand math, and yet still want their kids to learn it just like they did.

Barely understand? I'm computer scientist. Do you know the level of math knowledge that requires? Do you know how I'm able to do it? Because I had a strong math foundation at school.

And I have a BSEE. But I don't remember how I learned math in K and 1st. I don't mind the way they do it now, as long as the kids are getting it. All of these strategies are tricks, to help you along, the same way learning that the digits of the 9s multiples sum to 9. They're intermediary math tricks for young children, to give them fluency and a firm, concrete grasp of numbers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:but you might use doubles to solve 47+58: Break down 58 into 3+50+5 and then combine 47+3 to get 50, use doubles to get 50+50=100, then add the 5 to get the answer of 105.

My math teacher would be appalled at such a clumsy, inefficient, ridiculous solution. I'd get a C for this in best case scenario.
But in CC worksheets this kind of math is acceptable. That's the problem with the curriculum. This is an example of CC I found on Reddit:

Then your math teacher would be a bad math teacher. Anybody can memorize an algorithm. But if you don't understand what you're doing, it's just a mathemagic formula.

There are lots of different ways to do 47 + 58, in addition to the standard algorithm (47 on top of 58, 7 + 8 is 15, write 5 below the line in the ones column and put 1 on top of the tens column, 4 + 5 + 1 is 10, write 10 below the line in the tens column, the answer is 105). For example:

40 + 50 + 7 + 8
47 + 3 + 55
58 + 2 + 45

What's more, those are not actually "clumsy, inefficient" solutions. They're good ways to solve 47 + 58 mentally, without paper and pencil.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These threads always drive home for me how much we need higher math standards, whether CC or otherwise. A generation of parents who, for the most part, barely understand math, and yet still want their kids to learn it just like they did.

Barely understand? I'm computer scientist. Do you know the level of math knowledge that requires? Do you know how I'm able to do it? Because I had a strong math foundation at school.

And I've written and published papers, using the strong reading foundation I had at school. That doesn't mean that I know how to teach a child to read. In fact, life is full of similar examples: I've given speeches, but I can't do speech therapy. I play the piano, but I can't teach piano. Knowing how to do something and being able to teach somebody how to do it are related but different skills.

[Anonymous]

THere's no indication that teachers really understand these newfangled strategies, either, which are simply gimmicks.

You an crow about "critical thinking" but I don't see any of that with Common Core math standards or the accompanying curriculums trotted out to support it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:but you might use doubles to solve 47+58: Break down 58 into 3+50+5 and then combine 47+3 to get 50, use doubles to get 50+50=100, then add the 5 to get the answer of 105.

My math teacher would be appalled at such a clumsy, inefficient, ridiculous solution. I'd get a C for this in best case scenario.
But in CC worksheets this kind of math is acceptable. That's the problem with the curriculum. This is an example of CC I found on Reddit:

Then your math teacher would be a bad math teacher. Anybody can memorize an algorithm. But if you don't understand what you're doing, it's just a mathemagic formula.

There are lots of different ways to do 47 + 58, in addition to the standard algorithm (47 on top of 58, 7 + 8 is 15, write 5 below the line in the ones column and put 1 on top of the tens column, 4 + 5 + 1 is 10, write 10 below the line in the tens column, the answer is 105). For example:

40 + 50 + 7 + 8
47 + 3 + 55
58 + 2 + 45

What's more, those are not actually "clumsy, inefficient" solutions. They're good ways to solve 47 + 58 mentally, without paper and pencil.

This. These strategies are mental math tricks. Highly effective in understanding numbers. Countries who do well on PISA tend to emphasize these a lot more. I grew up in China and did all sorts of calculations like this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

THere's no indication that teachers really understand these newfangled strategies, either, which are simply gimmicks.

You an crow about "critical thinking" but I don't see any of that with Common Core math standards or the accompanying curriculums trotted out to support it.

This is a good point. My first grade seems to intuitively know how to make ten and do two digits addition in his head. Some teachers may not be have that intuition and instead make it really rigid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

THere's no indication that teachers really understand these newfangled strategies, either, which are simply gimmicks.

You an crow about "critical thinking" but I don't see any of that with Common Core math standards or the accompanying curriculums trotted out to support it.

How are they "gimmicks"?

I haven't noticed anybody crowing about "critical thinking". "Understanding", yes, but not "critical thinking".

[Anonymous]

I haven't read all the responses, but I recognize the math curriculum as I teach it in fourth grade. It looks like go math. I just want to say it is not a terrible curriculum, but it is challenging. It challenges all my students, which is one of the reasons I like it. All of our assessments are word problems. I think that is great. Kids really need to think. I can really tell who the bright students are--they are the ones who think. Your child who is struggling is still learning the math, but they will continue to do poorly until they learn how to reason. It is that simple.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I supplement my first grader's math at home. We use Singapore math with a bit of Kumon worksheets to reinforce the material.

At home DD is doing well, a bit above her grade level.

At school they follow Common Core and her grades started to go down. I'm very puzzled. I think a lot of the time she doesn't understand the instructions which can be very confusing. Sometimes I read CC worksheets and think "wtf?"

Do you have any advice what to do?

If you can afford, I highly recommend dreambox. Let her do 10 min per day and you will see the difference in 6 months or so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

This. These strategies are mental math tricks. Highly effective in understanding numbers. Countries who do well on PISA tend to emphasize these a lot more. I grew up in China and did all sorts of calculations like this.

I grew up in Russia. We had a very strong math curriculum and math culture when I was growing up. http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703740004574513870490836470

We did not do any of these tricks. We had a very strict, very rigorous system. We were not allowed to use calculators, at all. No multiple-choice answers EVER. We had to learn to prove all theorems ourselves. We had to memorize a lot of things. All the concepts were drilled, drilled, drilled to ensure we had a good foundation before moving on. I bet most of my Russian friends, after thirty years of not touching algebra or geometry will still be able to recipe Pythagorean theorem and solve a system of linear inequalities.

And no there was no way you would get to 7 by doing 4+4-1. My math teacher's favorite saying was "You shouldn't scratch a left year with a right hand", meaning that a math problem should be solved the simplest way.

I agree with PP. I don't see the link to critical thinking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I haven't read all the responses, but I recognize the math curriculum as I teach it in fourth grade. It looks like go math. I just want to say it is not a terrible curriculum, but it is challenging. It challenges all my students, which is one of the reasons I like it. All of our assessments are word problems. I think that is great. Kids really need to think. I can really tell who the bright students are--they are the ones who think. Your child who is struggling is still learning the math, but they will continue to do poorly until they learn how to reason. It is that simple.

OP here. I looked through all the recent papers. My DD does fine on actual computation. What she does not understand is the CC strategy. Because she's using her own strategy. So her school work looks kind of like this below.

She solves similar problems in Singapore math just fine, just because the instructions are not so confusing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can you give examples of the kinds of problems your first grader has been given? My first grader is currently doing math mountains and word problems, not complex stuff for a parent to figure out at all.

Here are a couple of examples she gets from school. This is the kind where I go "what the f--- ?" On the bottom one I think they were told by the teacher to use only two numbers, not three. She wouldn't have thought of this herself.

The first one I would have skipped and told the teacher we decided not to do it because it was stupid. The second one should have been 3+3=6 6-3=3 I would think.