Posted on 11/10/2019 7:39:16 AM PST by robowombat
Seattle Schools Propose To Teach That Math Education Is Racist—Will California Be Far Behind? by Lee Ohanian
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
California’s latest K–12 test scores were released earlier this month. Despite spending 26 percent more per pupil after inflation since 2011, test scores remain low, and improvement is proceeding at a glacial pace. Just 40 percent of California schoolchildren are proficient at math. What should be done? Seattle’s idea is to teach their students that US math education is racist, is used to oppress people of color and the disadvantaged, and has been used to exploit natural resources.
According to Seattle educators, math instruction in the United States is an example of “Western Math,” which apparently is the appropriation of mathematical knowledge by Western cultures. While everyone agrees that two plus two is four, three times three is nine, and that there are three hundred and sixty degrees in a circle, Western Math critics worry about more nuanced issues, such as why we teach kids Western counting and not, for example, how the Aborigines count.
Apparently, ancient cultures also used different terminology to refer to addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. They may have focused on geometric shapes different from triangles and circles. They may have called the degrees in a circle something other than degrees. And now it seems that math education—in all of its abstraction—should become culturally and socially focused away from those Westerners who coopted it.
Seattle’s new proposed math curriculum will take US public school math instruction where no one has gone before.
Students will be taught how “Western Math” is used as a tool of power and oppression, and that it disenfranchises people and communities of color. They will be taught that “Western Math” limits economic opportunities for people of color. They will be taught that mathematics knowledge has been withheld from people of color.
If you are struggling to understand the logic of this, you are not alone. For the life of me, I don’t know how the Pythagorean theorem, for example, or Euclidean geometry, more broadly, oppress people or communities of color, or how these foundations of mathematics have been appropriated by Western culture.
In fact, I really doubt that anyone whose foremost interest is in culture—Western or otherwise—thinks much about Pythagoras or his famous theorem and whether the relationship between the sides of a triangle denigrates people of color or has been used to promote WASPs and the wealthy.
Seattle’s proposal implicitly claims that it will be more successful in teaching math. Perhaps, but I am unaware of any compelling evidence supporting this view. And I see no reason why telling kids that they have been oppressed by “Western Math” would lead to better learning outcomes.
For example, would anyone understand geometry any better if they knew that Pythagoras may have been a vegetarian, or that he may have practiced mysticism? (I am assuming that these two practices are outside mainstream Western culture, but then again, maybe the West has appropriated veganism and mysticism? This is really making my head spin.)
Would kids learn how to tabulate numbers more effectively if teachers spent weeks describing the history and use of the Chinese abacus?
Seattle’s idea about racist math education will be right up California’s alley. Last August, California educators released a draft of a statewide ethnic studies curriculum for public comment.
The California curricular proposal also focuses on racism and is heavy on ideology, with pot shots taken at most anything and everything “Western.” Take for example capitalism. In one of the most uninformed economic criticisms I have ever seen, the proposal states that capitalism is a tool for power and oppression (sound familiar?), which fits right in with Seattle educators.
Just how bad is California’s student math performance? You can judge for yourself, based on the following question that was asked to 11th graders: Add the square root of 16 and the third root of 8.
The square root of 16 is 4 (4 x 4) and the third root of 8 is 2 (2 x 2 x 2). Four plus two is six. Doable for a 17-year old who has been taking mathematics, yes?
No. Only about 37 percent of students answered the question correctly. This percentage is not much above 25 percent, which would have been the number of correct answers if students had simply randomly guessed from the four possible answers provided. We had better either improve math education pronto or start to recruit better-trained students to the state.
There is a better way to help California’s kids succeed at math than to go down the road of racism and identity politics. Simply reintroduce the principles of math education used in the state before the development of Common Core curriculum.
Before Common Core, California had its own mathematics curriculum written primarily by Stanford University Mathematics Department faculty.
An independent review of California’s pre–Common Core math curriculum gave it a grade of “A” and noted, “If any state has math standards right, it’s California. The Golden State’s standards avoid almost all the pitfalls of other states. . . . All in all, the state has a top-notch blueprint for mathematical excellence.”
But as education experts have noted, the Common Core math curriculum was never developed to be on par with best-practice international standards, nor did Common Core provide adequate coverage of K–12 math topics.
It is not racism nor the appropriation of mathematical knowledge by Westerners that is the reason for deficient math learning by our children. It is something much simpler. It is a poorly designed math curriculum that the state mistakenly adopted. It is easy to improve.
Improving outcomes is easy in principle. Change the curriculum and add teachers who know how to teach math. But sadly, at least in California, this will be almost impossible to implement in practice.
Communist used bourgeoisie vs proletariat. Neocommunist use white vs everyone not white.
I went to the link (at the risk of PC police kicking in my door), when you see the scope and size of shall I euphemistically say “western civilization” accomplishments it is an awesome list indeed. Every time I see some race hustler crying into a microphone about cultural appropriation I want to take the mic away and tell him that mic and the network you are using is ours bubba.
Home schooling ping.
I too went the same way, but I also taught for several years — even had to use common core but in HS there is little difference because fundamentally math is math and the kids only want to see how to get answers.
But calculus is still taught but it is part of the AP program. Co is Computer Science, which means it is an elective available to students who meet the criteria set by the school and the teacher in charge. I required that my AP Comp Sci students have finished algebra 2 to take the AP course.
Pretty much the conclusion that Darwin comes to in his book, The Origin of the Species.
I I wanted "people of color" to become slaves again, this is how I would do it.
Yeah, except for all those students of east and south Asian heritage who don’t seem to have any problem grasping STEM subject matter and embarrass everybody with their high scores despite being “oppressed” by Western culture.
Oops! Forgot the mandatory < /sarcasm> tag.
I used a slide rule to get my first college degree but soon hand held devices could get many more decimal places with the same understanding. Next came devices that could run a simple algorithm and the power of the digital computer was unleashed.
Better tools led to better engineers and it was not the use of the tool that led us to become socialist idiots. The teacher’s union has long held that teachers should teach the new tools too, they will do practically anything to keep the gravy train going.
The use of devices to play games may be teaching our kids that they do not need to study things that are difficult. If so, this is why they don’t build any ability to think for themselves.
“It is something much simpler.”
At least 1/2 of the students have an IQ below 85.
And you can’t fix stupid. I don’t care what methods are used.
Seems NOT teaching a subject isn’t education but liberal indoctrination.
I propose that, since Seattle’s educators believe capitalism is so racist, they should have the courage of their convictions and refuse payment for their services.
This concept rests entirely on the stupidity of the teachers.
This concept rests entirely on the stupidity of the teachers.
No Calculators from First Grade on through High School and Math Teachers who are proficient in Mathematics and can teach.
Yeh and what’s amazingly stupid is that those same Asians and Indians tend to vote for moronic leftists. SMH.
Abolish government schools.
So the remedy of the problem is to withhold mathematics knowledge from people of color?
I have the belief that calculators should be banned in K-12.
If you want the kid to understand, machines can’t do the job.
The cult of feeling, subjective truth - My truth is not your truth - concensus science, participation trophies, group think, is becoming more and more visible as an actual conspiracy to make American children unable to compete or even understand the way things work. Hand in hand with over-regulation and appeasement foreign policy, the whole thing is designed to make America a slave state for the global elitists to bleed dry.
I told my children: "Last week their goofball idea was to banish drive-in windows to combat climate change. This week it's "Math is racist!'"
We all laughed! These people are so funny!
We're waiting for next week's nutcase idee de la semaine. It's like waiting for the funniest cartoon of the week.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.