California’s Memory Loss

The California Mathematics Framework has taken another step, with the latest draft released last week (many Word documents, many idiots). Critics who wish to comment have been given about three minutes to digest the thousand pages and then do so. For those who care to try, Jelani Nelson has posted an anonymous person’s monster work in compiling and PDF-ing the CMF documents, and tracking the (mostly lack of) changes. It is pretty clear that the CMF Powers don’t give a stuff what anyone thinks, but opponents gotta do what they gotta do.

There’s not much point in us working hard on this (our earlier snipes are here and here and here). Undoubtedly, Brian Conrad will soon update his site with comments on the new draft, and Greg Ashman has written on the CMF gang’s love of making things up.  We’ll just comment a little on one aspect of the CMF madness: memory.

Continue reading “California’s Memory Loss”

Jo Boaler, Ever the Victim

Jo Boaler, the Nomellini-Olivier Professor of Education at Stanford University, has just posted on her recent mistreatment at the hands of a campaign against her. The post is titled,

Crossing the Line: When Academic Disagreement becomes Harassment and Abuse  

Boaler’s post includes detailed claims that she has received abuse, rape threats and more, the truth of which there is no reason to doubt and which if true then obviously points to inexcusable and disgusting behaviour directed at Boaler. The problem is, Boaler is also playing a game. Again.

I briefly discuss Boaler’s latest post, below, but first and mainly, I want to outline a prior dispute involving Boaler, which went public in 2012. The purpose of revisiting this decade-old dispute is not to distract from Boaler’s latest claims, but to provide needed context for these claims.

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Brian Conrad Rips into the California Mathematics Framework

We haven’t paid all that much attention to the California Mathematics Framework, except for noting Jo Boaler (and Keith Devlin) making an idiot of herself again (ditto Devlin). We’re too busy with the local clowns. Greg Ashman, however, has noted a remarkable new front in the war over CMF, and it is worth highlighting. Continue reading “Brian Conrad Rips into the California Mathematics Framework”

Professor Smarts Defends Professor Karen

Yesterday we wrote about Jo Boaler, her latest own goal and some of her checkered history. But her defenders are coming out as well to, well, defend her. Fair enough. Except, that their defense is dishonest and farcical. As it must be.

Yesterday, Keith Devlin took time off from trying to start World War III to retweet support for Boaler:
Continue reading “Professor Smarts Defends Professor Karen”

Jo Boaler Shows Her True Colours, Again

There’s something poetically unfair about Jo Boaler being whacked this way and that for gouging some poor school district, and for threatening a black guy with calling the cops. The gouging was real and the threat was undeniable, and undeniably nasty, but none of it was surprising for Boaler and none of it was the point. Her gouging and her being a Professor Karen are not the main reasons why the people now whacking Boaler are so enjoying whacking her. But, God it is fun to watch, and God she deserves it. Continue reading “Jo Boaler Shows Her True Colours, Again”

Tony Gardiner on Problem Solving

This is our final excerpt from Teaching Mathematics at Secondary Level Tony Gardiner’s 2016 commentary and guide to the English Mathematics Curriculum. (The first two excerpts are here and here.) It is a long and beautifully clear discussion of the nature of problem-solving, and its proper place in a mathematics curriculum (pp 63-73). (For Australia’s demonstration of improper placement, see here, here and here.)

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Tony Gardiner on Financial Mathematics

Our first excerpt from Tony Gardiner’s Teaching Mathematics at Secondary Level is here. Our second excerpt is a short remark on “financial mathematics” in a mathematics curriculum (p 75). The relevance to Australia’s draft curriculum is obvious.

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WitCH 55: Oregonian Dreamin’

It must be something in the water.

This one, with due credit to Bill and Melinda, will be appearing in plenty of right wing snicker-rags in the very near future. It’s really a PoSWW. However, given the previous (and much more important) post, we decided to make it a companion blivit-WitCH. (As well, we’re working on another post on this stuff, in defense of it.)

Courtesy of the Oregon Department of Education, teachers there are being offered a “micro-course” on Equitable Math Instruction. More specific links are below. Good luck, and Good God.

LINKS 

1. Dismantling Racism in Mathematics Instruction

2. Fostering Deep Understanding

3. Creating Conditions to Thrive (zip file)

4. Connecting Critical Intersections

5. Sustaining Equitable Practice

Whole Course (zip file)

Glossary

 

WitCH 54: California Dreamin’

UPDATE (23/03/22)

Apparently, California’s draft has been recently updated, and of course the draft still sucks. Also, it is worth noting two public campaigns against the draft, here and here.

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OK, this is one of those blivit WitCHes. Yeah, sorry, but what are you gonna do? We don’t have the time (or the stomach) to give the stuff below the full-blown critique that it warrants, and there is a stormfront much closer to home.  Given the thing has been brought to our attention, however, it also seems an error to not raise it on this blog. And so, here we are.

The inestimable Jo Boaler is one of the writers for the California mathematics curriculum review, and the proposed new “framework” is now up for public comment. The screenshots below are from youcubed‘s newsletter, and further below are links to individual chapters of the new framework (all also available here, along with other relevant material). Good luck. Continue reading “WitCH 54: California Dreamin’”

Obsessive Compulsion

Last week, the New South Wales government came out with the next great plan to Save Mathematics Education: make mathematics compulsory up until the end of high school. Why? According to Premier Gladys Berejiklian, this will “ensure students have the numeracy skills required to succeed in today’s society”.

Yes, of course. In exactly the same way, for example, that compulsory instruction in ethics ensures that lawyers and cops act ethically.

What’s the source for this latest nonsense? Well, it’s kind of, sort of from the Interim Report of the NSW Curriculum Review, which was released a few days earlier, and which is prominent in the Government’s media release. Like all such reports, the NSW Report is barely readable, the predictable mishmosh of pseudoscience, unweighted survey, statistics of undeterminable worth and contradictory motherhoodisms. Thankfully, there’s no reason to read the Report, since the NSW Government hasn’t bothered to read it either; nothing in the Report points to making mathematics compulsory throughout high school.

Still, it was easy enough to find “maths experts” who “applauded the move”. Jordan Baker, the Sydney Morning Herald‘s education reporter, quoted four such “experts”, although the only expert appearing to say much of substance was doing anything but applauding. Greg Ashman, who is always worth reading (especially when he is needling nitwits), pointed to the need for specialist teachers in lower years. He is then quoted:

“You need to move away from the fashion for inquiry learning and problem-based learning and instead focus on high quality, interactive, explicit teaching of mathematics. Do that, and I believe numbers in year 12 would organically grow.”

In other words, if you stop having shit teachers teaching shit maths in a shit manner in lower years then maybe more kids will choose to stick around a little longer. (Ashman is more collegial than this writer.)

The NSW government’s compulsion will undoubtedly push mathematics in the exact opposite direction, into ever more directionless playing and mathematical trivia dressed up as real world saviour. You know the stuff: figuring out credit cards and, God help us, “how to choose cancer treatment“.

To illustrate the point perfectly, Melbourne’s Age has just published one of its fun exam-time pieces. Titled “Are you smarter than a 12th grader?“, the reader was challenged to solve the following problem from yesterday’s Further Mathematics exam:

A shop sells two types of discs: CDs and DVDs. CDs are sold for $7.00 each and DVDs are sold for $13.00 each. Bonnie bought a total of 16 discs for $178.00. How many DVDS did Bonnie buy?

The question this problem raises isn’t are you smarter than a 12th grader. The real question is, are you smart enough to realise that making mathematics compulsory to 12th grade will doom way too many students to doing 7th grade mathematics for six years in a row? For the NSW government and their cheer squad of “maths experts”, the answer appears to be “No”.