(01-16-2015, 07:34 PM)Naunet Wrote: Math problems/tests have never just graded on the correct answer in all of my years of schooling. Showing your work and doing that work properly was half if not more of the points given to the question.
And thank God for that!
(01-16-2015, 07:34 PM)Naunet Wrote: Students are having trouble transitioning from raw memorization (a rather depthless "understanding") to the new method, which is both understandable and expected.
For me, the jury is still out about whether or not the Common Core produces better understanding. I will say that it would be difficult for it to encourage worse understanding than traditional procedural memorization.
In my opinion, the biggest problem with the way math is taught today is how little playfulness there is around it. Math isn't stodgy. It isn't boring. Yet kids are expected to grind through a bunch of "practical" math before they even get a hint that it's fun to play with. I've known a number of mathematicians, and most of them got their initial love of math by learning it in a very playful environment. One got his start playing games with his mathematician grandmother: playing games with a compass (the point-and-pencil kind) and the like. Most of them never really understood there was anything serious about what they were doing. They were simply playing games.
The essay Lockhart's Lament was a big influence on me when I was teaching my daughters math. I wished I'd have run across it earlier, because we spent an awful lot of time working through the Singapore curriculum, and an awful lot of energy trying to make up fun things to do with what they were learning.
