What's Wrong with Math Education in the USA?

Just some rambling thoughts about education in the States in general with math as the emphasis. This is directed at others from the USA, so a few definitions for the purposes of this video: "international" means not from the USA as does "other countries."

And, of course, I'm generalizing.

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• Math
• educations
• USA
• culture

[rheechashaipu]

Michio Kaku has popularized science and quantum physics with his numerous lectures, video specials, and books. His star quality in the media is built off of teaching math and science. Yet no matter how many people he woos by explaining math and science in laymen terms, people won't pursue studies in those subjects.

These people don't think math and science are boring. Who could find the idea of multiple universes boring?

[jamesblackburnlynch]

@rheechashaipu An old friend and I discussed something related to this lately. You, in my opinon, are confusing cosmology and other exciting to almost everyone subects with math. Mathematicians don't have people beating down their doors to answer the big questions about the universe. We don't have those answers. And that's true in the classroom as well. Yes, people need to understand math to really understand those answers. But that's not enough to make it interesting.

[rheechashaipu]

@jamesblackburnlynch

It isn't JUST having the students review old math concepts. I think the idea is offering students another source to learn and implement math in case the school is failing to provide a fitting math education.

As for the social aspect of math...I don't think kids these days see math as boring, nerdy, and lame. I honestly think that math is disliked because most people were pushed to new math subjects without really gaining proficiency in anything.

[jamesblackburnlynch]

@rheechashaipu What did you observe to come to your conclusions about social views of math? As a math professor, I know that the moment I tell someone what I do, there's a 70% chance the next thing they will say is "Oh, I hate math." Now, that is adults. I can also tell you that college kids today consider math to be as nerdy as ever. Could it be that attitudes have changed for the younger folks? If so, I don't see it on Nickelodeon.

[leah8tn]

I've been in the USA for a few years now and still find this whole emphasis on sports scholarships for college to be bizarre. I think there simply is not enough math taught.

[polishpaul]

I think you're right on the money. I've always wanted to learn more math and sciences when i was in school, but there is no possibility to specialize until college.

But even more so, its completely insane how its BAD to be smart in the USA. The kids in school will ridicule you and many don't want to look/be smart because they will feel ostracized by their peers. This is actually huge - the culture in the US has a very bad outlook on education and being smart. :(

[rollsthepaul]

If we were serious about raising standards and interest in math, the work of Dan Winter and Nissam Haramein, would be taught very early. Of course, their work opposes our left brain world and shows us that we are children of the universe and have incredible potential. That is the last thing TPTB want to happen. They want us schooled, not educated because educated people question everything and practice critical thinking. TPTB want us just smart enough to do all the shit jobs and be satisfied.

[Shadowriku40]

@jamesblackburnlynch I assure you - he is all about intuition. If you watch his trig identity videos, he says over and over again, "if you have the intuition behind it you can derive the identities. . . when you're 50, if you're still doing trig." Also, early in the Chemistry playlist concerning the periodic table, he says things like "You can memorize these trends, but if you know WHY the trend is like the way it is, you won't need to." (quotes may not be exact)

[jamesblackburnlynch]

@Shadowriku40 I've now watched the TED talk. But it doesn't address his "intuition>memorization" philosophy. It's just about how to use video to replace standard teaching models. But at least I now know what it is. I can go to the Academy and at least see these instructional videos.

The one thing I have to say is that I think he had some bad classroom experiences in the past. It sounds like he thinks the classroom is a group of silent students watching someone lecture at the board.

[Shadowriku40]

@jamesblackburnlynch Salman Khan believes the same as you (intuition > memorization). Please research some videos where he talks about his idea. Perhaps his TED talk, for starters.

[boshea8498]

@tomthecool completely agree. i think we should focus in k-12 on the basis of these ideas. like explaining somewhere that the real numbers should cause intuitive difficulty and actually explaining it (maybe go axiomatic). talking about limits. adding exponents another magical event. real grounding of the rationals. equivalence classes. inverses the number zero. dividing by zero. if there is explanation its given once and then said oh dont worry about its not important. you may as well just stop

[rheechashaipu]

ts will demoralize the student into thinking that math is extremely difficult and impossible to learn. Giving up on math, that student will go off to study a social science (which isn't bad) when the alternative pursuit could've been in nuclear engineering.

And to think, if that student had some special one on one attention to figure out his/her math deficiencies, the outcome would've been very different.

(btw, sorry about my poorly written posts)

[rheechashaipu]

People won't rush after those subjects because they've been conditioned to think that math is impossible.

Think of how the education system is set up.

Students are rushed through k-12 math concepts with some bad learning resources. If a student doesn't learn an essential math concept, well, too bad. That student will have to settle for not understanding any further math concepts and will perform horribly on most of the graded tests and assignments.

The bad grades on the tests and assignmen

[rheechashaipu]

Perhaps saying "I'm a math professor." would turn off the interests of some people. When I tell people that I'm studying bioengineering, most of the time the response is, "Oh that sounds cool!" Then I ask, "Would you consider studying bioengineering?" Most of the time the response I'm given is, "I would but that subject involves too much math and I'm no good at it."

There are scientists and mathematicians who are admired by people of all ages. Look at Michio Kaku for example.