[N_Fiddledog]

Just on a hunch I Googled "Ontario New Math."

$1:

Return to basic skills first step to fixing Ontario's math problem, teachers say


As the province prepares to embark on a complete "curriculum refresh" hoping to address years of slumping math scores, several Ontario educators say the key is going back to basics.

They argue that students need more class time to work on core ideas like multiplication, division, decimals and fractions — time they say was taken away when the government introduced a more conceptual math curriculum more than 15 years ago.

Veteran teacher Carla Silver, who has taught math to kids in Grades 4 to 8 for more than 30 years, gives the example of a student she had who never fully memorized her multiplication tables during elementary school.

"Consequently, she never finished a math exam in all of her high school years," said Silver. "The kids need to have those numbers at their fingertips."

That student, she said, is not an isolated case.

"There's a lot of kids who don't know their number facts. And we are not encouraged to review them."

Math 'collapsed'

She says she often ignored the new curriculum when she saw her students couldn't keep up.

"I did what was needed, because when I tried to do what I was supposed to do, it didn't work," she said.

Teresa Murray wants Ontario to review its math curriculum
Retired teacher Teresa Murray launched a petition more than three years ago to pressure the provincial government to change the math curriculum. (Sola DaSilva/CBC)

Vanessa Vakharia, who owns a math tutoring company called The Math Guru, agrees that something crucial is missing.

"The kids don't have the foundational skills, so they're in the classroom learning these amazing abstract concepts and being taught to problem solve but they don't know what two-times-five is," she said in an interview on CBC's Metro Morning.

Teresa Murray has been campaigning for a return to basic math skills for five years, ever since she retired from more than 30 years of teaching Grades 1 to 6 in Hamilton.

In her view, math education "collapsed" with the new curriculum, which introduced what is at times referred to as inquiry-based learning, discovery learning, or constructivism, and which put a new focus on open-ended problem solving and group work.

More at Link

[herbie]

HAH HAH
Yeah I had some toruble with advanced calculus. I figured out how the scientific calculators did it, better explanation than the teachers I had. Went back and aced the course.
We're talking about basic math here. There's no need to "get" the times table sheet, it's about as obvious as can be. If 10 minutes with a box of pickup sticks doesn't prove that to you, you ARE thick as a brick.
Or lazy AF, other side of the same coin.

[Sunnyways]

IMO this is part of a deep misunderstanding of the importance of recitation in our culture. For generations, multiplication tables up to 12 were treated as holy writ, a sine qua non of any youngster's progress in school. Along with mental arithmetic and poems committed to memory, they gave kids a foundation to think of arithmetic and literature any time they wanted completely independent of books, to say nothing of more advanced gizmos. The person who has these tools doesn't have to turn to a machine for answers to every calculation, and knowing some decent poetry by heart sets a standard for what we say and write. Rote learning, now despised by many educators, can change one's inner life. We shouldn't abandon this ancient tradition so easily.

[Strutz]

LOL to some of the examples shared in this thread about how lack of basic math skills shows in everyday life and business. A previous job I had in the restaurant industry showed me just how much some young folks were lacking in basic math skills. Part of my job was to verify previous day's cashouts where all they had to do was add two figures together to determine their cash submission. Two dollar amounts. It was amazing even when they all had cell phones with calculators that they had difficulty with the calculation. Hell, it amazed me to see their sloppy printing of their own names and the date that they had to write on their submission slip as well as on the daily sign in/out sheet. I also remember memos to staff being posted in plain and simple English and having employees still ask what the memo said and what it meant. I recall one of them actually saying to me "Why should I read it when you could just tell me what it says?"

[herbie]

Pisses me off grocery shopping. The number of people "amazed" at how high the bill is, the number who have to "put stuff back".
You can round shit out and keep a running tally in your head as you shop, it ain't that hard. In the days of cash, I'd always have enough $20s pulled out and maybe had to dig a few coins out of my pocket. But there's 3 people amazed at how much they spent and just stick in the Visa or debit and pay it and two more who finally put their damn phone down and root around for 20 minutes digging up the cash ahead of you.
And then there's the ones I see around here... come into town to the store, grunt "Ughhh... coke!" at the clerk and then hold out a handful of change and let the clerk count it out for their Slurpee. Can't add, can't count, can barely speak FFS.

[Tricks]

Love all the old fuckers who seem to think this is only a young people problem.

Get over yourselves.

[herbie]

Way worse than that. So many old people around who can't figure out 10% of $2.00 we sure as hell don't need even more!
Which is why the 'some people aren't good at math doesn't cut it with me. Tack on 60 more years and they still didn't learn.
Not that I haven't and don't make a living off people who just refuse to learn shit.

SLAP!!! Stop talking!
SLAP!!! Stop fidgeting
SLAP!!! Stop fretting
SLAP!! SLAP!! SLAP!! Have you reached that OMMMM state of crystal clear awareness that you're totally focused on the fact someone is slapping you silly? Good... now look at that pile of coins. I owe you 40 cents and handed you a dollar. You owe me change, right?
uuhhhhh
so if you give me what it makes 50 cents?
uhhh a dime
and what makes another half dollar?
uhhh two quarters
so you need to give me how much
uhhhh uhhh uhhh 60 cents
and you write that how?
uhhh $0.60
Right! You just learned decimals you already fucking knew decimals before you got to Grade One! Don't you feel especially stupid it took you til 45 to realize it?
SLAP!!! (let it sink in)

Nobody failed Math from the Gestapo Nun at Our Lady of Abject Misery School.
Father O'reilly was good too.
If I stick FOUR inches in (UGGHHHH!) and I then stick another TWO inches in (UNNNGGGHHHHH!!) then HOW MANY? How many inches, Billy?

[Thanos]

Actually if they haven't learned to make change after 60 years it's evidence that they really aren't good at math, whether from laziness, legit disability, or just plain dumb.

[housewife]

I worked with a woman that screwed up the cash all most daily. No amount of yelling helped and she wasn’t young either. She actually told me it was ok cause I could fix it. Mind you she also told me that work gave her the diabetes. It hurt your brain to talk to her sometimes.

[bootlegga]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

N_Fiddledog N_Fiddledog:

But yeah, Teeny cashier girls drive you nuts with their inability to do basic math.

Like if you group 4 quarter into a pile they should automatically see a buck. So many of them can't seem to do that.

The enlightened education establishment dispensed with multiplication tables and flash cards because they wanted kids to use horrifically complex processes to perform routine calculations when in reality some facts you simply just need to memorize.

Piss off a liberal: Print this out and hand it to a kid.

Meh, I think you consider me a liberal and I gave one of these to my daughter (Grade 2) last year. Basic math like this should be known by everyone.

[bootlegga]

herbie herbie:

Nothing to do with 'liberal', Bart's chart should be known by Grade 3.
Matter of fact, it should've been updated to go to 16 by the mid 1980s.

I don't buy the 'some people aren't good at math' excuse. I buy the 'some people are stupid' reality.

I'd argue it should go up to 20 or even 25.

As for the 'people aren't good at math', that statement is too general. It depends on what kind of math you're talking about.

I got straight As in math until I hit Grade 8 or 9 when I got introduced to algebra, polynomials, trigonometry and all the rest of that abstract crap, and then I dropped to a C student. But the basic stuff, as well as statistics, where you just plug numbers in formulas, I still got great marks.

Some math is HARD, and that makes people doubt their mathematical ability, but basic addition, subtraction, multiplication and division are easy enough that the majority of people should have a firm grasp on it by the end of elementary school.

[xerxes]

Exactly. And the same with me. I did well in math until about grade 10 then my ability to do well hit a plateau. But that’s just the way I am. I’m a memorizer and changing up equations on me just threw me for a loop.

I can still do all the essential math needed for day to day life. And so should everyone else. Saying your no good at math means that calculus and physics isn’t your thing; it doesn’t excuse you from being able to figure out how much tax you pay on groceries or making change or things like that.

[Sunnyways]

I got a surprise when I started playing darts and found other people correcting my calculations. Same with golf. Mental arithmetic is potentially everywhere. Fluency with it enriches us in both senses.

[Coach85]

bootlegga bootlegga:

As for the 'people aren't good at math', that statement is too general. It depends on what kind of math you're talking about.

I got straight As in math until I hit Grade 8 or 9 when I got introduced to algebra, polynomials, trigonometry and all the rest of that abstract crap, and then I dropped to a C student. But the basic stuff, as well as statistics, where you just plug numbers in formulas, I still got great marks.

Some math is HARD, and that makes people doubt their mathematical ability, but basic addition, subtraction, multiplication and division are easy enough that the majority of people should have a firm grasp on it by the end of elementary school.

Math is like any other skill, like playing hockey or baseball. Every student and athlete has a natural plateau.

Like hockey, most people can learn how to skate, shoot the puck and make a pass, but it's those with the higher plateau of natural ability that is able to take on the advanced teachings of an athlete.

[Thanos]

xerxes xerxes:

Exactly. And the same with me. I did well in math until about grade 10 then my ability to do well hit a plateau. But that’s just the way I am. I’m a memorizer and changing up equations on me just threw me for a loop.

I can still do all the essential math needed for day to day life. And so should everyone else. Saying your no good at math means that calculus and physics isn’t your thing; it doesn’t excuse you from being able to figure out how much tax you pay on groceries or making change or things like that.

Same. I was doing good in Math 13/23/33 in high school with around a 60-70% average mark. Then I got goaded into going into Math 30 and it just collapsed and wrecked my overall graduation average. Barely squeaked through with an even 50%. I could do some fairly basic trig and algebra without much difficulty but tossing in those tangents and arcs just ruined me. This is why I'm saying what I'm saying here. Don't put someone in something that's beyond them just so they can get crushed by finding out the hard way that it's not suitable for them. None of this Star Trek level fantasy crap where some people are actually saying shit like calculus should begin in Grade 6, and not just for the little psycho future STEM kids, but for everyone.