Everyday Math Part 1

These videos are a continuation of my response to the original Inconvenient Truth videos of MJ McDermott.

I finally got my hands on the Everyday Math series. There's a great deal to say, and I say much of it very quickly. The book isn't in the shot as much as I'd like, but I suppose it doesn't really matter as it's what the topics are about, not so much what the pictures look like.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• everday
• math
• reform
• inconvenient
• truth
• understanding
• saxon

[ArchNME]

You know what would be awesome, if you actually did a video series teaching this stuff. You are a math teacher after all and youtube is sorely lacking in general educational videos.

[SmartBlondie1314]

I did Everyday Math in Elementary school and I hated it. To this day in highschool, I still have problems doing some basic math things because of EM. EM does go to fast, in fact it was rare we ever covered all the material in it in elementary because it was so confusing so the teacher had to spend extra time helping us. I would cry over my homework because I didn't get it and my parents had no idea how to do the stuff. I do no recommend this program.

[heyvov]

@jamesblackburnlynch In your other video, "Math: Why memorizing procedures isn't enough", one thing that helped me realize those procedures were wrong is because you can't factor anything out of (2+x)/x. If you have 2x/x, the x's aren't "canceling", you're factoring out x/x which is one, so the answer is 2.

[heyvov]

Yes - we were the first group in our district to use Everyday Math/Connected Math. In High School we used the book "Integrated Mathematics," which seemed to take the opposite approach.

Right now I'm in "College Algebra." I'm really enjoying math, and learning the fundamentals and using pen-and-paper for easy problems is helping me out in Chemistry. The drill-and-kill problems, combined with having to write detailed journals explaining the concepts is helping me study in other classes, too.

[jamesblackburnlynch]

@heyvov Youtube has been very helpful with that. I've heard from students (who are the most likely to agree with me, I've found), parents and other educators. I put these videos up to have discussions about these topics, not to tell people THE WORD. I've been convinced by all these voices that EM is too hard (too many concepts at too deep a level) and that the Singapore books are superior.

[jamesblackburnlynch]

@heyvov By the way, I think it's time to dump factoring. As you said, you can always use the quadratic formula (for quadratics). What is the point of factoring? (I do have several answers but most people could care less about them. Factoring is necessary for proving some trig identities and so on...) And actually, isn't the quadratic formula still easier? It certainly would be for any problem not manufactured to be factorable. Real life is rarely factorable. To an engineer too.

[jamesblackburnlynch]

@heyvov So you are in college now? You must have had some early form of these books. The ones I've seen wouldn't have been around when you were in elementary school.

I'm for whatever works for you. Please make sure you keep asking the question, WHY are we doing this? whenever a new thing is introduced, be it a formula to memorize or a process or a new definition or anything else. Story problems are a good way to get that motivation, but keep going.

[heyvov]

@jamesblackburnlynch For example, by the time I got into high school, solving for "x" using the Quadratic Formula was much easier than factoring for me, because I didn't have a good sense of numbers.

[heyvov]

There wasn't enough space allowed above, but I also want to say I appreciate you taking the time to reply. Too many folks in academia don't take the time to listen to anyone with an opposing point of view, so it's appreciated.

[heyvov]

Right now, I'm paying the price of Everyday Mathematics/Connected Mathematics -- I want to go into Engineering, but I'm in remedial math because I can't do ANYTHING without a calculator. As a result, I don't have any conceptual skills either. Now, I can't use a calculator, we learn the concepts by doing lots of problems, and THEN they introduce story problems. In addition, twice a week for 2 hrs we work in groups solving challenging problems - I love math now because it actually makes sense.

[jamesblackburnlynch]

@heyvov Obviously, I don't agree. As a professor, I find students, even in college, have come to the conclusion that there are NO CONCEPTS to learn in math, just a bunch of skills to memorize or meaningless formulas to use. The concepts EM teaches are not (at least the beginning ones) above the abilities of the students. The concept of a "carry digit" makes more sense than just teaching them a mysterious process. EM is not the only book that does this however.

[heyvov]

Everyday Math is GARBAGE - you can't teach higher-level thinking if your students don't have the basic skills to begin with. Teach the math skills, reinforce it with homework, and THEN teach the concepts. That's why Everyday Math is so frustrating for students and so ineffective - students can't grasp the concepts if they don't know how to do the work to begin with.

Not to worry, though, the student can just pull out a calculator and do it that way.