Teachers' math skills 'alarmingly weak' ( Canada )

Winnipeg Free Press ^ | 09/10/2011 | Nick Martin

[george76]

Math professors are appalled at the lack of math skills they see in some education students -- who in turn can't adequately teach math to their own students when they get in a classroom.

"We've kind of been watching a train wreck," University of Winnipeg math Prof. Anna Stokke said Friday.

So far, 184 people have signed a petition demanding far higher standards for admission to faculties of education, 173 of them math, science and engineering professors. They're demanding the provincial government beef up high school graduation requirements for people intending to become teachers.

Some teachers didn't get adequate math courses when they were in high school and thus can't teach their students properly, the petition alleges.

...

The professors want the province and faculties of education to require future teachers to have Grade 12 pre-calculus or applied math.

"We're seeing a lot of (university students) coming in with consumer math," Stokke said. "It's a disaster. They're coming in with grade-school math.

"We're seeing students come into education with extremely poor math skills."

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

"We're seeing students come into education with extremely poor math skills."

That's a feature, not a bug. Schools exist to provide employment to people who cannot make a living with their hands, or their heads.

[Opinionated Blowhard]

LOL. $90K per year divided by working 8 months = I’m underpaid. Yep, poor math skills.

[NavyCanDo]

Here in Washington and many other states across the country the schools have adopted the most horrifying math curriculum imaginable. Everyday Mathematics. This curriculum must be stopped.
His 2nd grade math often left us scratching our heads not knowing how to help him with the algorithms alien to us. He is now in 4th grade and the school district dumped the program last year thanks only to parents that were up in arms.

This video link must be seen.

MATH EDUCATION: AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr1qee-bTZI

[HangnJudge]

I used to tutor calculus at an engineering school

Time and again someone was failing
because of some principle they
should have learned 3 years before,
but didn't and now they were way over their head

[3Fingas]

That's what a TI-89 is for......



Perfect for sub par Canadian and American Math teachers. :-)

[george76]

Government Schools to provide employment to people or teach students ?

[HangnJudge]

That's what a TI-89 is for......

Do not make me come over there and hurt you
Poor grounding in math will hobble a student for life
worse than a Ethnic Studies

[Future Snake Eater]

I’ve seen that video. Impossible to understand. What complete idiot bureaucrat got paid off to OK that curriculum?

[Right Wing Assault]

Math professors are appalled at the lack of math skills they see in some education students -- who in turn can't adequately teach math to their own students when they get in a classroom.

So don't graduate them, dammit!

[HangnJudge]

Math is the study of symbolic logic
Damaging a student's understand of math
will impair their ability to think logically
for the rest of their life

A teacher who does not understand this
is in the wrong profession

[Mr.Unique]

Here in California, the problem is fully institutionalized. The state approved text books are riddled with errors and the teachers aren't smart enough to recognize the errors.

[PapaBear3625]

A guy with a Master's degree in math is qualified to teach freshman math at the community college, but not qualified to teach seniors math at the high school because he doesn't have a Ed degree.

I say we scrap the Ed degree requirement and let anybody who has a degree in the subject being taught, and who has taught for two years at community college, to be deemed qualified to teach high school students.

[DungeonMaster]

President’s math skills alarmingly weak. (USA)

[Tex-Con-Man]

Teachers' math skills 'alarmingly weak'

...but their self-esteem is off the charts!!!

mmmm-mmmm-mmmm...

[NavyCanDo]

“I’ve seen that video. Impossible to understand. What complete idiot bureaucrat got paid off to OK that curriculum?”

Came out of the University of Chicago. Tell you enough? I still have his 2nd grade book, that I show others. Nobody can believe it. It is as bad as the lady in the video says.

In third grade they did change to a much better book, much like what I would of had in 3rd grade - but the teacher was horrible. He once brought a math test home with 24 single digit multiplication problems on it, like (3 X 7 =). He got six correct, two he did not fill in an answer, and 16 he got the wrong. She only marked the two with no answer as wrong, and put a “good job with smiley face” on the top of the page. She and the principle got an earful from us.

[ken21]

comrades! rejoice we’re destroying the evil capitalist school system.

/s

[Savage Beast]

U.S. school teacher's announcement to class on a museum field trip (overheard by a close friend of mine):

"And now, children, in this room we're going to learn about World War Eleven."

(The friend didn't know whether to speak up of keep her mouth shut.)

(She kept her mouth shut.)

[3Fingas]

Really, I am on your side. Peace, man. LOL.

[3Fingas]

Agreed. I wish I had paid more attention to math in high school. It is no fun having to go back to college and take Calc 1-3 and Linear Algebra in your late 30’s. Painful LOL there.