AntiBVBL

Very interesting MH. I’ve seen bits and pieces about the Math Investigations controversy but didn’t know what the details were as to how math is taught under this program. Sounds strange to me. Many people have enough problems learning math without making it more complicated, which is what this sounds to me. I was lucky that math always came easy to me, which is why I took up Electrical Engineering as a major. Anyway, sounds like this is one math program that needs to be scrapped. Is Math Investigations just taught in PWC or is this a statewide thing? I sort of gather maybe it is just a PWC thing, in which case it definitely needs to be changed.

Sorry, I meant to address this to Alanna instead of MH.

M-H is steering clear of this one. I personally have not seen it taught and I have talked to people I have great respect for who love it and people I have great respect for that hate it.

I believe we have to look at what is best for all children. Drill and kill is no longer an acceptable math practice. The math expectations of those coming along now are far different than were the expectations of those who graduated 20 years ago. Numerical sense does not seem to be an area most of our kids do well in, if SOL scores are any indicator.

What would probably be a deciding factor for me is the delivery system. Are the teachers who teach this program really behind it and doing a good job? Have they bought in to the program? If they haven’t, then why not? Is it their own basic lack of understanding? It seems many. not all, elementary teachers fear math.

Actually, I am going to go with whatever Turn PW Blue has to say. He and I have discussed educational issues before and I know he is knowledgeable about this program. So Turn PW Blue, where are you on this issue?

Oh boy, I remember when “New Math” was introduced in the early 60s. (Tom Lehrer has a wonderful song about it). Kids had to learn to work in base “8″ which Lehrer described as “the same as base 10, if you have lost two fingers”.

There were special classes for parents. My husband, a geologist, had a lot of math in his background, and even he couldn’t quite understand the New Math. It died out rather quickly, I might add.

Sometimes I wonder whether text book publishers are behind some of these educational changes.

Wow, something the anti’s and the bvbl crowd agree on….how about that! Alanna, Fordham, I’m green with envy! I wanted to go to Fordham for Medieval Studies (I studied Medieval Ecclesiology). Not complaining, went to Catholic U instead, which was nice, but I always had my eye on Fordham!

MI is different and is going to challenge the “traditional” way we all were taught. But different doesn’t mean better or worse. It means just that–different.

MI is intended to teach a conceptual understanding of math beyond rote memorization of facts. It may seem “silly” to those of us who have completed advanced maths, but the fact that people like your college roommate exist is precisely why MI exists. The idea behind MI is to provide a foundation of basic number sense–what do the digits and symbols *mean*–before going into the mechanics of how to do standard algorithms.

It is actually pretty easy to teach multi-digit addition or multiplication to children. But if they have no concept of what they’ve just done, it’s nothing more than a cheap parlor trick. I’d much rather my child know that multiplying 16 x 24 means I have 16 sets of 24 items than have them be able to get the “correct” answer with no concept of what that answer means. MI attempts to provide that conceptual framework.

Do I think MI is perfect? No. The complete eschewing of traditional algorithms and the use of unfamiliar vocabulary for the sake of being “different” from “traditional” math is problematic. But from what I’ve seen in my children’s classrooms, their teachers are doing a great job following the MI structure while supplementing where appropriate. Contrary to the hype, my daughter is allowed to use traditional algorithms and she knows her multiplication tables (though we never drilled and killed her–she learned them using number charts and factor table a la MI).

I will note that lots of the people who struggle with understanding MI never really had any problem with math. We are a lucky minority when you look at test and research data. Our brains are wired differently than most and math comes to us easily. For the vast majority, traditional methods of the past left them out in the cold when it came to really understanding math.

Huh? Old blog and new blog agree? The “We Are One” idea is coming to fruition. Alanna, I had no idea you were such a math wiz on top of a computer wiz.

This is just a little too much ” We are One” if you ask me.

Thank you TPWB, for your explanation and insight into the program. As I stated earlier, while I haven’t seen the program implemented, I trust and respect TPWB’s opinion and judgement. I also know he has a strong math background and comes from a household of teachers.

As a newly certified English and US History teacher I was logically charged with
teaching New Math to 7th graders nearly four decades ago. May God forgive
me for the damage that was done. Hopefully, those middle age folks can
balance their checkbooks — without Boolean algebra. It was a fad that sold
some textbooks and assured parents the school system was “doing something”
about low math test scores, but it did more damage than good. May I suggest
caution as you move forward.

A quick voice of dissent here….I like MI. My fourth grader thrived with it the last two years. Now, her school barely uses MI and we’re having the same math homework battles I had w/ my older children. I attended many, many parent and teacher MI work shops over the past two years, and I was impressed by Carol Knight’s efforts to get the word out there about MI: why it works, and how to help your children during the transition. Honestly, my child transitioned easily. She was understanding math concepts on a level her older sibs NEVER understood in elementary school. I raved about the program to the teacher and principals.

And then the backlash started and I fear MI is destined for the dust heap. It’s really too bad. Now, my fourth grader says math is her worst subject and she hates it. That’s a 180 degree turn from where she was this time last year. She got a perfect score on the third grade SOL, btw.

My other daughter, a HS senior who attended PWC schools (three of the best), and learned math the “old way,” has had a weekly math tutor since third grade. Yes, third grade. She’s taken college prep math courses all four years of HS, and she hates it. A B is a high achievement in those courses, not easily met. She hates math and can’t wait for the day when she is finished with math for good. That’s very, very sad.

She would have thrived under the MI curriculum.

Alanna:

The central office Math Department has done a poor job with communication when it comes to supplementing and what *is* and *isn’t* “allowed.” The MI materials don’t explicitly cover the standard US algorithm and there is a warning not to introduce “shortcuts” like the standard algorithms *before* there is the conceptual understanding the underlies the math in the standard algorithm. But there is nothing that says that a teacher *can’t* teach something when the child is ready for it.

I think a lot of the confusion stems from the fact that, let’s face it, many elementary school teachers are like your college roommate–baffled by math themselves. You state that 2+2 will always equal 4 and that is, indeed, correct. But what does that equation represent? Two of something plus two of something add up to make four of something. Seems simple but there really are people who have no concept of that meaning behind the equation. They memorized that 2+2 always equals four but don’t get the *why*. How about the concept behind borrowing for multi-digit subtraction? Lots of people know how to do it, but really don’t understand that the digit to the left represents 10x the digit you’re looking at. The point of “investigating” is to build that fundamental understanding of mathematics as processes and logic, not because there isn’t a simpler way to come up with the right answer to the problem in front of you. It’s analogous to the old saw about giving someone a fish or teaching them to fish. It’s a lot easier to give them the fish, but what have they done to learn to sustain themselves in the long haul? I would much rather our children understand what is going on process-wise starting with simple equations than have them be able to compute complex numbers with no understanding of what they are doing outside of a mechanical process. That fundamental number sense is what is going to make them successful in more advanced, abstract mathematics like algebra and calculus. In terms of the learning process, the type of work done in MI actually uses a different part of the brain than the more traditional drill and memorization we grew up with. Not coincidentally, MI tries to stimulate learning in the same part of the brain that is used for higher level problem solving and computation like that found in algebra.

Last year, my daughter had an assignment that opponents of MI love to slam. She was asked to determine which was greater, 9 X 5 or 6 X 9. Now, traditionalists would say, easy. 9 X 5 is 45, 6 X 9 is 54, 54 is greater than 45, 6 X 9 is greater. Done. Move on to the next problem. This was early on in the year, so the class had not completely learned their multiplication tables. My daughter looked at the problem and said that 6 X 9 is the same as 9 X 6. With the problem rewritten, she then said having 6 sets of the same thing is more than having 5 sets of the same thing. 9 X 6 is greater. Her answer took longer and was certainly not efficient. However, using the MI method, she demonstrated an understanding of what multiplication really means and demonstrated the commutative property of multiplication–a foundation of algebra.

I agree that the lattice method seems a bit silly, but it’s only *one* method for solving a problem (and if it’s being presented as the only method, then the teacher isn’t teaching it right). Again, when you look at surveys of elementary teachers, many will say that math was their worst subject and part of the reason they were drawn to elementary versus high school education was precisely to avoid the complexities of math that confused them as students. These are people who by and large were more comfortable with times tables and worksheets with printed answer keys. MI challenges not only the students to think critically about mathematics as a skill, but also requires a different level and type of knowledge on the part of the teachers. One thing PWC Schools needs to do better is prepare the teachers for teaching MI.

I think casual observer’s anecdotal evidence is exactly why a program like MI is needed. Too many of our students struggle with math. My mother-in-law was a math teacher and math specialist in Fairfax County (before a stint as a middle school assistant principal then retirement). After reviewing the MI work my daughter was doing she said she was finally hopeful that someday when she told people that she taught math for many years she’d hear something other than “oh, I really hated math” or “math was my worst subject” or “I never really understood math.” Students who excel at math will still be challenged by MI as there are many opportunities for enrichment and more advanced work. Students who struggled in the past with more traditional approaches to math, though, are suddenly finding that math isn’t something to be feared and it really is something that can be understood.

PWC Blue: Excellent analysis. Thank you for putting this so much better than I did. I cannot tell you how thrilled I was with MI when my D started it in second grade, before it became a political football. Honestly, when did a math curriculum become conservative or liberal?

If the “old way” of learning math worked, our kids wouldn’t lag behind the rest of the world in middle school and high school math scores.

Kids today need to understand HOW numbers work. Our new technologies demand that level of understanding. They weren’t getting that through rote memorization of math facts. My youngest D, courtesy of MI in second and third grade was actually playing with numbers, and wasn’t afraid to figure out different approaches to the same answer. An approach, I’m sorry to say, that led many proponents to the conclusion that MI is fuzzy, or just about math games. If I could have had you all in my home when my D was doing purely MI homework, you’d all see what I mean. She was having fun with math, yes, but she was developing such a good sense of number theory — which is really the foundation of algebra.

I can’t overstate how saddened I am that MI — should it even remain in PWC schools after tonight — is destined to become so watered down to the point where I think those teachers who can’t or won’t learn how to teach MI will feel they have permission to abandon in it. I’m afraid this has already happened in my D’s fourth grade class.

I hope the Board allows parents to choose an MI or Traditional track for their children — with that option available in EVERY school. There are some teachers in our school who love MI, and I hope they can continue to teach it the way it is meant to be taught. That’s the math program I would choose for my child.

Casual Observer:
What elementary do your kids attend that MI isn’t being taught? I thought it was mandated at all schools?

There are parts of it that I think are good for younger children but as an entire curriculum, I find it lacking. When I watched the school board meeting in the fall with that Math teacher from Fairfax of over 35 years who had been on some national math panel and that guy said he’d throw MI in the trashcan under his desk, I knew there was a problem.

I have to completely agree with Alanna’s observations and that is what I’ve seen with my younger kids. There will always be kids in a family that do excellent in math and those who struggle. Out of my 5, 3 appear to be math whizzes, 2 of the 3 whizzes had no MI. The other two will probably require tutoring at upper levels of math, 1 of the 2 is MI and the other had no MI , although I don’t think anecdotal evidence is sufficient for the school board to make a decision. Same family, same genes, but different results with MI.

The proof needs to be in the testing. Did SOLs go up last year in the grades that had MI? NO, they didn’t and pass advanced percentages went down. That says to me that MI is isn’t as terrific as the school board would like us to believe.

Offer a choice and that should quiet people like Alanna and myself. We’ll be happy with our kids in traditional. Then in 5 years look at test scores and compare all MI kids with traditional kids. If the MI kids do substantially better over all, the MI lovers will have their proof and they can shut down choice. If traditional kids do substantially better then MI will likely fade away with other new so called great education ideas like “open concept classes” which the county just spent millions closing up into closed classrooms.

Being able to multiply using lattice multiplication is not the desired outcome of MI. It is an alternative method of mulitiplication that was used before the modern printing press was able to set up the format we now see when multiplying 2 or more digits. It is an excellent method of teaching students with spacial difficulties, for what that’s worth.

On the other hand, it is better to remember something than nothing. Most adults would go get a calculator nowadays. Remember that hand held calculators were not even affordable until the early 70s.

Most students are very weak in number sense. Many cannot tell what is greater: 1/8 or 2/5 just at a glance. Most either get a calculator or computer to decimal form just to answer a question that is part should be intuitive. Estimation skills are weak. Not enough students take upper level math classes beyond what is required for a diploma because they lack concept understanding, not calculation skills.

Any old fool can go buy a $5 calculator at Target and become excellent at calculations. That is not what our students need. Our students need to understand mathematical concepts before they begin to process algorithms.

Madmom, MI hasn’t been around long enough to collect solid data on its use. 1 year is insufficient to evaluate the success or failure of a program, especially using testing tools like the SOL test which is not a good evaluator of higher level thinking skills.

Have you seen grades 6, 7 at the middle school level under traditional math instruction? It is HORRIBLE. There are schools with a 13% pass rate. Unacceptable. Most middle schools in Virginia have not made acceptable progress because of 6th and 7th grade math scores. This problem did not start in 6th or 7th grades. It started down in 1st grade and worked its way up.

I remember growing up with the traditional math system of rote memorization of math facts and I was utterly lost. Not only could I not picture what 4×4 looked like, I struggled to remember that 4×4=16. Those timed tests in math class reduced me to tears. I was a constant finger counter, and eventually I developed a system for myself that was later dubbed as “Touch Math” (though I’m pretty sure that I invented it). To this day, if I have to add a long column of figures without benefit of a calculator, I use the touchmath method. I struggled with addition, subtraction, multiplication, and the oh so dreaded long division…especially when there were remainders. However, some bright spots in my elementary math experiences was the ease of which I learned fractions, time and money. I am one of the few people that can count back change to someone:) High school math: Alg1, Geom, Alg II, nearly killed me, and required constant tutoring. I was never so lost. Yet, when I was in college I had to take 2 semesters of statistical research methods and I found it to be quite understandable. My sister, the math genius, says that I grasp math which my brain finds “applicable”. Abstract math (ie algebra), is more difficult for me, because I cannot “see the picture”, according to my sister. I would have probably benefited from MI. But I don’t think that there should be an either/or form of teaching math. A well-rounded curriculum should encompass both MI and the traditional math learning methods. That way, students who learn differently, those who see the forest and those who see the trees, and those with certain learning disabilities can all find a way to be successsful in math. Years after I graduated from college, I signed up to take the Praxis exam for my license. I bought the study guide and freaked out when I got to the math section because once again the algebra felt like Greek. Luckily for me, my sister broke down the questions for me, and put it in “real terms” as far as I was concerned: When the problem states this question, then you use this formula. For the first time EVER I aced an algebra test. Go figure. By the way, those of you with middle school girls…UVA has a professor who is offering a girls and math summer enrichment course for girls in grades 6-8. There are also many other summer enrichment courses in math and engineering and science for students grades 4-11, as well as other courses such as literature and drama. See the UVA website for details.

Just trying to imagine having
a child in the FLIT program!

DS, many people feel just as you have. Thank you for sharing the other side of the issue with us. Let’s face it, most people are not ‘math people.’ Most people don’t have math people parents to help them. MI needs to be here for those who might need to use alternative methods to grasp the concepts.

What’s really interesting is when you actually talk to people who are good at math (and really just *get* math), you’ll find that many of them, consciously or not, are employing the very methods MI endeavors to teach to all children. I did well in mathematics (completing through advanced college calculus). As I work with my children on their homework, I find that I had already naturally incorporated many of the “new” MI strategies in my daily life. I have always skip counted. I have always broken numbers apart when doing multiplication in my head (142 x 16 is 140 x 10 + 140 x 6 + 16 x2). I often change a number to make a problem easier (142 x 16 is 150 x 16 – 16 x 8). And so on. These are things that came to me naturally. But for lots of people, math is not something innately obvious.

As for the math panel in the fall, I was on that panel as well. I had the opportunity to have dinner before hand with all of the participants (with the exception of Mr. Vern Williams–the teacher from Fairfax referred to by MadMomof5–who had another commitment prior to the math panel and couldn’t make the early dinner). Dr. Skip Fennel, who also served on the National Math Advisory Panel, was also part of the panel. Funny how no one remembers him–guess it’s because he didn’t seem to have an issue with MI. The conversation over dinner centered on the desire of all those present to make math accessible and “learnable” to a larger cohort of students.

The point is that there are “experts” on both sides of this issue. Interestingly, it is those entrenched in the elite class of mathematicians who find issue with MI and have been some of the most vocal opponents. That is not surprising. They learned and thrived doing things the “old” way–it worked for them, so shouldn’t it work for everyone? But with all deference to the Wilfred Schmids and R. James Milgrams of the world, elementary mathematics is not cutting-edge research mathematics. We would be well-served by having those involved in the teaching of elementary and middle school students (and who understand human cognition as well as mathematics) involved in designing a math curriculum that builds a strong foundation so that once those students get to Dr. Schmid’s or Dr. Milgram’s graduate classes solving multi-dimensional differential equations, there may be more than a handful of them. Being an expert in complex mathematics does not make one an expert in how to teach those same concepts (or the foundational elements that support those concepts) to someone else. I think K. Patricia Cross (a noted educational researcher) put it pretty succinctly:

In what may as well be starkly labelled smug satisfaction, an amazing 94% [of college instructors] rate themselves as above average teachers, and 68% rank themselves in the top quarter of teaching performances.

Slowpoke, what is Medieval Ecclesiology? It sounds interesting but I am clueless here. My brother is an Medieval English specialist, whatever that is. I think it means he can read Beowulf but I am not sure. duh me.

I am not sure of MI, but when I purchase something for say, 7.92, and handover 8.02, I love the face of the (well past the MI age) clerk when they think, and what do I do with the two cents.

I agree DB, a well rounded curriculum, but from what I have heard, well rounded is NOT be implemented school wide when it comes to the marriage if MI with traditional methods.

Slowpoke,
I too am intrigued!

Hey my grandfather went to
Fordham at the height of the late 1920’s. He was a law graduate during the depression. He turned his law degree into a Latin teaching degree for the Youth House of the Bronx..aka reform school. He continued teaching for Youth House until his retirement in 1970. Lee harvey Oswald at one point was in his Latin class.

Well Pat you give them a dime in change.

Elena,
Is there trully a difference between MI and the state sponsored TTACs for math? Do the lessons from the TTACs really copy from the Math Their Way curriculum of the 80’s or am I just dreaming? Doesn’t even the entire MI curriculum some how smack of Math their Way mixed with m-n-m’s when it’s brought down into it’s tiniest components. Aren’t we really paying school-wise just for some recycled math phase from either the 60’s, or the metric system we all failed or the early 80’s? Are math curriculums that easy to copy?

Parents are qualified to make math decision about their own children. However, I do not think most can see the big picture for an entire curriculum that reaches all children. I will go so far as to say most teachers cannot make that determination.

Alanna:

I don’t think there can be any “decision” on this immediately. Chairman Johns posted this as an Info item, not an Action item on the Board agenda.

I don’t think anyone really is saying that parents are not qualified to be part of their children’s educational experience, but what people are saying is that public schools have to have the interest of all the students in mind *and* that professional educators *are* more qualified to make some types of decisions concerning the educational process as a whole. Just as I don’t think the guy in row 2B should fly the plane (but has every right to demand he makes to his destination on time and safely), I do believe that there are times we should afford teachers and educators some respect for their knowledge and expertise.

Too bad that geat master educator Professor Letiecq now feels he is in the driver’s seat on what math programs are taught. You could see that the school board was unimpressed with his desire to control.

Too bad Mr. Richardson and Mr. Lattin talked back to the great Professor L. They will be in his sites now. Let the assassinations of their character and job skills begin.

Mr. Richardson is apparently more observant than our BOCS. He recognized cut and paste from the I hate Investigations website. Our BOCS sure didn’t recognize it from the FAIR emailers who couldn’t find Prince William County on a map if you held a gun to their heads. Maybe Mr. Richardson will replace Mr. S. Oh wait, I forgot, Mr. S was behind the entire FAIR mass emailing….or at least he knew about it since he is a member of HSM.

To turnPWblue; trouble is we want to go to California and they are flying the plane towards Santa’s workshop at the North Pole or to Fantasy Island.
50% of teachers disagreed in the counties own survey that MI meets their needs.

You don’t hear from them because they are afraid of getting fired.
The math department don’t want a choice because 1. if word gets out, most will opt for the traditional choice and 2. their pet program will look bad because the parents with the math gifted kids are the ones clamoring for more challenge.

You’re welcome; it was a late night but we finally got to hear how most on the board felt.
I think if the program had been implemented with more balance and challenge, we wouldn’t be here but they blew it.
They swallowed the TERC line about dangerous short-cut algorithms hook line and sinker and are now trying to regain some balance to appease those who noticed that it isn’t working.
At this point, it is too little, too late. They are too biased to investigations to listen to reason.
Some of the investigations alternative strategies are valid; I love the changing the numbers approach when the numbers merit it but if you spend all your time trying to remember which strategy works best, you’re not going to finish the test.
MI doesn’t ever encourage efficiency or provide enough practice for mastery.
If the life work is 2 simple math questions, you’re never going to get proficient.

I tend to look to the words of experts and those in the math industry when gathering data regarding a program of instruction. With regards to Math Investigations there are legions of research indicating that the program poorly prepares our children for higher mathematics.

You might also want to start by checking out the work of Dr Stephen Wilson, Professor of Mathematics at JHU, Author of the Fordham Foundation Review or Mathematics Curricula, adviser to the US DOE on mathematics curricula standards, and member of the groups revising Washington State’s mathematics standards. I think it’s pretty safe to say that this guy knows what he’s talking about when it comes the math. Dr Wilson has reviewed MI’s content. His conclusion, which was presented in testimony before the Frederick Md School board in June, can be summarized by one statement

“I am not really here today to talk to the Board, but to the parents. If your child goes to a school that uses TERC Investigations, you should understand that it means your child’s school has abdicated its responsibility to teach your child mathematics. By doing so, the responsibility now rests with the parents. Good luck.”

Here’s a link to his web site with more information http://www.math.jhu.edu/~wsw/

Another spot to check out is Dr. Bill Quirk’s, Phd in mathematics from Cornell, assessments of MI against the NMP recommendations and reviews of it’s content appropriateness. Among his conclusions are:

“NMP 2008 is very clear about the foundations of algebra. Mastery of standard arithmetic is essential. Mastery isn’t possible without practice. TERC provides no practice for standard arithmetic. ”

“TERC promotes “mental math” methods and the use of calculators. They offer one “general” whole number computational strategy for addition, subtraction, and multiplication. Relative to the standard algorithms, TERC’s alternative methods more openly reveal underlying place value details. The price for this “transparency” benefit is significantly reduced computational efficiency. The TERC alternatives also reduce the need for carrying and borrowing. But TERC is not satisfied with reducing the need, they want elimination of the need. The price for this “total avoidance of carrying and borrowing” benefit is significantly reduced generality. TERC must carefully limit to special case problems to achieve this objective. As we’ve noted above, TERC doesn’t want to admit the special case limits, so we get the suppression of the embarrassing carrying and borrowing details. We also see borrowing avoided by the premature introduction of negative numbers and integer arithmetic. Somehow these advanced concepts are easier than the important concepts of carrying and borrowing. ”

Here’s a link to his site : http://www.wgquirk.com/

And if that’s not enough, check out this site form more research and information from groups across the country fighting to bring sanity back to their children’s education.

http://www.nychold.com/terc.html

Correction – Dr Quirk did not attend Cornell – he is a graduate of Dartmouth College and holds a Ph.D. in Mathematics from The New Mexico State University. Over a span of 8 years, he taught 26 different courses in math and computer science at Penn State, Northern Illinois University, and Jacksonville University.

Dr. Quirk? Is this a joke?

Academic educators will always disagree. They always have. They always will.

No joke; he’s very knowledgeable as is Dr Wilson from JHU.
Yes they will always disagree; point is at least 50% of the parents and teachers also think MI is not sufficient but that’s doesn’t seem to be enough to force a change.

http://www.wgquirk.com/TERC.html

Nope – that’s his real name! Poor guy – I’m sure he got a lot of teasing when he was a kid.

I posted the links to provide people with information they might not otherwise find unless they were searching for it so that they could draw their own conclusions.

Where is the data that 50% of the parents and teachers think MI is not sufficient? I cannot imagine how that data would even be gathered. Please explain.

Thank you for the link.

From the Prince William County schools math survey. Page 4 in the following document:
http://www.pwcsmath.com/Investigations/Program%20Evaluations/MathInvestigationsYear2ReportFinal.pdf

Why the school board said they didn’t realize opposition was so strong, I have no idea. This was presented to them in September.

This survey went out to a fairly large number (I think 2000 parents) but they only got responses from 18% of parents. They claim that it was a large enough sample to be statistically valid.
One of the ways TERC tries to appease complaints is the “we’re listening” approach. If parents get to respond to a survey, they think their complaints will be listened to.
But of course, they are just parents not “educators”.

“I cannot imagine how that data would even be gathered.”

And therein lies the problem, apart from the petition there is little more than anecdotal evidence. I’m not saying the discontent does not exist but that it is nearly impossible to demonstrate empirically.

That having been said, the condescending and dismissive attitude of several Board members (including my own) is unacceptable. I would wager a fair sum that Mr. Richardson would not address me in the manner he addressed the public last night were I to support their assertions most of which I have witnessed first hand.

Until last night I had a fair amount of respect for Mr. Richardson (although I had considerably less for Mr. Lattin), I can not say the same now and intend to speak with him on the subject. I have come to expect (and have gotten) similar treatment from Ms. Knight, I will not tolerate it from an elected official, particularly one I supported (note the past-tense).

Communication, cooperation and respect are generally two-way streets, if Mr. Richardson believes that opinions of the residents can be so easily dismissed, then perhaps it is time he found out what real opposition is at the ballot box. I will have to sit back and think about that one for awhile (I really hate the drive down to their offices).

If you see my previous link, you’ll find the evidence. The most telling is that only 33% of 3rd grade teachers were satisfied. Yes, it’s the first time they have taught it but it is very telling of how dumbed down this thing is; it is not challenging enough and is less appropriate, the higher you get.

More telling than whether people are “satisfied” (a non-empirical measure of an emotional response), is the data on page 3 and page 4 of the report Ed linked to (especially the tables on both of these pages).

Students in Math Investigations are succeeding. Their year-over-year development of math skills is actually at a faster pace than grade level. So much for MI being dumbed down and leaving out kids behind.

Give me a break. They did not take the Stamford tests before MI was introduced so have no way of telling if it is working or not based on that. The report rates their performance “average” within the US. That’s not a great endorsement.
Look at the advance SOL rates; I presented this to the board last night. 2007 to 2008, grades 4 and 5 along with Stafford and Fairfax grade 3 all improved significantly; PWC grade 3 with MI – flat (actually small decline).
Base SOL grade 3 pass, flat.

And yes, of course the teachers were “invited”. As citizens, they are allowed to speak the same as the rest of us but the way it was stacked with teachers and friends of teachers was a little distorting.

And while we are at it, perhaps you could persuade the math dept. to release the county-wide Cogat scores (or however it is spelled). They seem reluctant..
From the people I have heard from (obviously not a statistically significant sample), the computational results are very low as predicted by supporters of traditional math.

MI supporters seem to take a very black and white view of the role of MI. I like some of the MI lessons; I hate the dogma surrounding it’s implementation, the pace of the lessons, the lack of practice at simple arithmetic and the delayed introduction of efficient algorithms. Kicking of with word problems at a very early age is wrong according to the national math panels’ recommendations; the kids need the number sense before trying real-world problems.

I hesitate to mention it, but what the hell “Once more into the breach”.

I think the issue that seems to have slipped below everyone’s radar is the purported reasoning behind the implementation of MI, namely, the perceived/proven retreat in math proficiency, particularly that exhibited at the middle and high school level.

If I understood those middle and high school teachers correctly, they have seen proficiency slipping and believe that MI will reverse the course. As a side note, some of those same teachers have stated that they have already seen the results, a neat trick given that none of our precious guinea pigs have arrived in those middle and high school classes to date, but I digress. It occurs to me that they are banking on an unproven system to address the perceived shortcomings of traditional math, shortcomings that have only become apparent in relatively recent years. A roll of the dice, perhaps, a well-intensioned effort to improve scores, maybe, a calculaled effort to draw parents attention away from the real problem, most likely.

Traditional math seems to have worked out just fine for those responsible for the engineering and scientific breakthroughs of the past half century. It also seems to have worked well in the absence of pocket calculators. Perhaps the real problem is not the curriculum but rather the teaching and I am not confining that merely to the teachers, parents are just as responsible. It is increasingly apparent that getting the answer correct is less important than ensuring that Little Johnny feels good about himself and is properly socialized. No big deal if you count 14 socks instead of 13, but in the real world, dropping a decimal or making a one digit error can have catastrophic consequences. We might still be fighting WWII if Einstein’s theory were E=MC cubed and Neil Armstrong would still be outbound if a Nasa engineer had estimated the trajectory of a moonshot. Hmm, wonder if those Wall Street geniuses were taught MI.

The real problem isn’t the traditional curriculum, its the instruction and expectations. There, I said it, go sick Dr. Walts and the PC police on me.

What I don’t get is if MI is turning out such little math wonders, why are they sneaking connected math into the middle schools;
On one hand, Ms Knight told me there would be no problem transitioning to the middle school traditional math because MI teaches them to tackle any math problem.
On the other hand, they are telling the middle school teachers to learn to deal with the influx that won’t be familiar with traditional maths.

Something smells fishy to me..

In terms of the SDMT, the argument has been made by opponents of MI that MI is going to leave our children behind grade level and at a disadvantage because they are not learning what they should be when they should be. Regardless of whether they are learning as fast or as much as before, the SDMT results make is clear that the “our children are being left behind by this dangerous experiment” argument is pure hokum. Based on the SDMT results, children in MI have moved ahead at least at the rate expected and in a number of demographics more than expected over the course of a year.

CogAT is an aptitude, not achievement, test. It attempts to measure innate ability to do quantitative, verbal, and non verbal cognition, not learned behavior. So, if the quantitative results are, indeed, “low,” then we have a generation of students whose quantitative cognitive aptitude is lower than expected (which would correlate with the differences you note between PWC and Fairfax if, for instance, Fairfax’s CogAT scores are higher).

I agree that the “set in stone” dogma that standard algorithms are to be avoided and the use of non-standard math vocabulary (”refactoring” vs. “borrowing”, for instance) is problematic. I disagree with the idea that practice is lacking. From studies of the human brain and how we assemble information, immediate, extensive repetition is not as important as periodic review and repetition (which MI provides). (I’d suggest reading _Brain Rules_ by John Medina for an in depth look at how the brain “learns” and forms concrete memory). Further, MI provides many opportunities for enrichment for gifted or accelerated students. The lack of such challenges in PWCS is a problem that stems for curtailed training and preparation for the rollout of MI county-wide (two days of inservice training versus the two weeks recommended by the publisher).

Respectfully, I also think you miss the point of the “number sense” recommendations from the NMAP. That doesn’t mean teaching the mechanical process of solving equations using standard algorithms. It refers to developing a deeper understanding of the meaning behind the symbols and numbers. Elementary mathematics should be about building that mathematical fluency more than it is about teaching efficient means to an end. We teach whole words before moving on to contractions.

“We teach whole words before moving on to contractions.”

Two plus two is always four, at least in this dimension. Basic math is by and large a mechanical process and memorizing the basic is substantially different than abstract math or calculus.

On the other hand, which definition of contraction are you referring to, shortened words, the muscular movement, reduction in economic activity, … Apples and Oranges TPWB.

As you can tell, I don’t have the edu-speak and was educated in another country.
I do however, have the experience of having one child in each program.

Lack of practice is a major problem because the kids are not developing the instant recall needed to ease their progress at higher levels. One of TERCs own school aids in Boston said as much in a blog before the publisher pulled it.

If the lifework consists of 2 problems once a week, they get practice at solving a particular kind of problem but not practice at recall of math facts. Memorization of math facts on it’s own is obviously not sufficient but it is also required to make the solutions more efficient. That is the major piece that is missing; efficiency of calculation.

Oh and I don’t see any enrichment or advanced math going on; the teacher can’t deal with 27 kids all interacting and provide differentiation.

Those who see basic math as simply a mechanical process often fail to understand basic concepts later on down the road.

I watched the school board meeting. I saw very few, if any, minority parents, yet PWCS is a majority minority school system. Where were their parents last night? How do those parents feel about the program?

As for personnel, I have never known Mrs. Knight to be anything but courteous.

Teachers work for the superintendent who was hired by the school board. The school board is elected by the citizens. No teacher works for any parent.

At least one person I heard speak needs to go review the heirarchy and to realize that they do not employ PW Co teachers.

Mom – Great comments. I remember reading that the justification for implementing Investigations wasn’t declining ES test scores because those were rising, it was lower than expected SAT and middle school SOL scores, and what struck me as odd was the decision to implement a new elementary math curriculum in an effort to address those problems. Shouldn’t we have looked at the middle and high school curriculum first in an effort to address those problems rather than the elementary school curriculum? To my knowledge nothing has changed in either the HS or MS programs so, did the school system just give up on those students and decide to dedicate it’s resources to the elementary students? Strange.

As for the SDMT results, they did increase, but that was expected. The SDMT was first given county wide when Investigations was implemented. That year (2007) the second grade average score was about 80% and the first grade average score was about 70%. In 2008 2nd grade scores were unchanged at 80% while 1st grade scores increased 4 points to 74%. The thing is – we’d expect an increase when comparing year 1 to year 2 of an exam because teacher would know what was on the exam and adapt what they teach to it.

Similar increases from 81 in 2006, to 84 in 2007, to 88 in 2008, when the SOL was first given to 4th grade students.

Dolph – I to have noticed a lack of diversity among those speaking either for or against Investigations, and I’m not exactly sure why. When I scan the zip codes on the petition mentioned in the original article I note that they are from all over the county. I also seem to recall the Chairman Johns mentioned (and I may get the number wrong) that he’d received at least 2 emails from 26 different schools. I can’t help but wonder about the other 29 schools…….

I guess from what Ms Lucas said she hasn’t receive any comments from her schools so I guess those would be included in the 29.

I have a sneaking suspicion that the administration does not want to look at the root cause of the problems in high school. This might be impolitic and I mean no offense, but some people just don’t have the aptitude or desire for higher math. The same can be said for AP English or physics. The problem as I see it is that in the vainglorious pursuit of all things academic, the schools (and by that I mean virtually all systems) have diminshed if not eliminated virtually all vocational training. Back in the dark ages, I had the opportunity to follow the Poindexter route and take AP courses, Calculus, Physics, etc. While that opportunity has been expanded upon, those little Johnnys without the aptitude or desire for an advanced degree no longer have the Elrod option whereby they could pursue a technical trade such as plumbing, bricklaying, welding, auto mechanics, engineering drafting, cosmetology, etc. I had friends on both sides of that line in the academic sand and quite frankly many of those in the trades have a higher standard of living than those who chose the collegiate path. I guess its no wonder our kids can’t change a tire or figure out where to put the oil.

Very well put. You’re probably correct. Honestly, I prefer to blot my dark ages from my memory!!!

Dolph – for what I’ve researched, there are two general schools of thought regarding mathematics education (and I say general because the descriptions are rather nonspecific). The first is the school of though behind texts like Investigations – which hold that the standard algorithms and memorized formulas and math facts adversely affect the development of number sense and understanding and should be delayed until the child has a full and complete understanding of the concepts of numbers. The other, which underlies texts we characterize as traditional like Singapore and SFAW, holds that mastery of the standard algorithms and math facts to the point of automaticity frees the mind to explore more abstract concepts.

Because of the belief that the standard algorithms are dangerous, Investigations doesn’t work well with picking and choosing or changing lessons. It really is best as an independent, standalone curriculum. As such a curriculum which blends the best of Investigations with the best of other curricula is probably impossible. A blend will have to come from a traditional text supplemented with Investigations at the teachers discretion. As long as the county remains wedded to keeping Investigations as it’s primary curricula that means two tracks, with the alternate, traditional track available at the parents discretion, will have to be supported.

Vocational training has gone by the wayside which is too bad. Many kids are not ready and will never be ready for advanced courses. Yet NCLB and the State all seem to think everyone needs an advanced degree. Perhaps that explains the increase in high school drop outs.

Maybe everyone could take Math Investigations and those whose kids were bored could take additional math classes instead of music, art, library or PE? Kids probably wouldn’t like that.

Turn PW Blue- You mentioned looking at Cogat scores for PWC vs Fairfax, I haven’t even come across the historical PWC scores posted anywhere. Can you please share a link to where you found those little gems? thx

My kid loves the extra math he does at home; they want to be challenged, they don’t enjoy being bored.
The opt into traditional and return to traditional core text in 5th grade will do for now assuming we can get it passed. The results and choices parents make will hopefully finish the job.

Jake – I’m not sure pulling children whose parents would prefer a traditional math program from PE or music or art would solve the problem, especially as PE, art, music, computer, lab, science, and library all have tremendous educational value.

But you make a good point, well, many good points but this one jumped out at me. Our children already rotate at school for encores – many classes even split for encores and one group follows one schedule while another group follows a different schedule. Math could simply be another rotation and kids would simply go with their group to whichever math program they follow. So we wouldn’t have a school within a school, we’d just have kids going to different classrooms for math.

Kids have changed classes for years in PWC. Scheduling will always be a problem because of the relatively small size of elementary schools.

jp–never said I saw the CogAT scores. Just presented a hypothesis concerning performance vis a vis another district.

Turn PW Blue – You mentioned that CogATs measure innate abilities. Actually, it does NOT measure innate abilities. As stated here on the publishers web site, http://www.riverpub.com/products/cogAt/support.html#2
it measures abilities developed through experiences in school and outside of school. So low quantitative results could indicate a problem with the curriculum.

You’ll have to give him time to check with Ms Knight before responding to that one

The cogAT is a norm referenced abilities test, not an achievement test. Your abilities are developed from the day of your birth. Do experiences alter abilities tests? Yes, to a slight degree. So does illness, depression, and other emotional episodes.

Generally speaking, low scores on an achievement test MIGHT indicate curriculum issues. Low achievement on a math test might also indicate low or average ability as indicated on a cogAT or similar test.

SOL are criterion-referenced tests. They test if you grasped what was taught to you. So when teachers are accused of teaching to the test on an SOL, bingo. They are pretty much doing what they have been directed to do by the curriculum.

Princess Billy-Bob is correct. It’s impossible to teach to a CogAT test. If you’ve ever reviewed the sample CogAT booklets PWCS 3rd graders bring home before the test, you’ll see that the quantitative/non-verbal sections DO NOT test math achievement. You’ll see no “traditional” number sentences, computations or word problems. Rather, they use numbers, symbols and patterns to test a child’s number sense and innate ability in that area.

You can find a sample test here:

http://web.pccs.k12.mi.us/tag/PDF-Documents/TAG-PDF-FILES/CogATsampletestt.pdf

These are the tests the county uses to identify 3rd graders for Gifted Services. If a child meets a benchmark (97th percentile) in the verbal and/or non-verbal battery, they are identified and further evaluated for inclusion in Signet (the county’s GT program).

Actually, MI is big on number sense, patterns and symbols so it can help kids with the “language” of the CogAT better — much more so than algorithms would.

Kids who are very spatial (ie., love challenging puzzles, legos, tangrams, etc.) typically score well on the non-verbal/quantitative battery. These are things children are typically exposed to at home — and often before they ever start school.

Given that these are individual assessments of individual talents (or areas of weakness), I don’t know that it’s even possible or reasonable to compile the scores and use them to prove or disprove the success of the MI curriculum.

OK, well now I’m confused. I thought PWCS used the Naglieri to determine inclusion in the gifted program. If the Naglieri is used to identify gifted students, then what is the CogAT used for and why two tests?

They use Naglieri and CogAT. Nagilieri is especially good at identifying ESOL kids because it is non-language-based test that measures a child’s nonverbal and quantitative abilities.

http://pearsonassess.com/haiweb/cultures/en-us/productdetail.htm?pid=015-8706-005

http://pearsonassess.com/haiweb/cultures/en-us/productdetail.htm?pid=015-8706-005

I should add that all PWCS third graders take both CogAT and Naglieri.

A battery of tests is used for older kids when screening for SIGNET. Naglieri is sometimes used, sometimes not, depending on the child and the circumstances.

For general third grade screening purposes:

http://pwcs.edu/Gifted/documents/IdentificationSectionIIILocalPlan-12-06.pdf

The “lattice” method is taught in fifth grade and is part of the regular (i.e. traditional) math textbook. It is not Math Investigations.

Are you the same woman I laughed at the other night, watching the school board meeting, for making this mistake?

Here’s a question to all parents in the system grade k-4th. What would happen IF your child actually did NOT take the SOLS for their grade? If you decided as a parent/s to opt your child out of state testing what do you think would happen? Would your child be retained?….no. Would your child be unable to graduate from HS?….no. Would your child not be eligible for GT services?…no. Funny thing is as parents, we know we can opt out of FLE, and we can even opt out of sped testing. But very few parents realize that at the elem level, we have the right to opt our students out of the SOL tests as well.

individual elementary children could gain alot of peace of mind by not having to be a part of a state testing process that has yet to prove itself with any sort of nationaly normed validity and reliablity. Students could be freed from test packets and the like. The losers would be the indidual elem schools that rely on the test scores of their students for both fame and funds, and the parents that believe so much in the hype of the scores. Schools could save money by not putting their focus on remediation or the VGLAs, children could spend more time at recess or PE. The children would certainly gain from a release from the elem SOLS, and quite possibly their teachers could too.

Why is the lattice method “nutty”? Simply because it is not the way you were taught? Or because it doesn’t appeal to the way your mind works?

If the method works for your daughter, makes sense to her, and helps her find the right answer then you are doing her a grave disservice by compelling her to abandon it. Not all brains work the same way, and the algorithms that were easy and workable for you in your youth were not so easy and workable for everyone. If you daughter thrives by using some of the alternative conceptual options she has learned, it is selfish of you to mock them just because they aren’t what you know.

In my opinion, this Math Investigations controversy is far more about the parents than the children.

Do you have kids in the program? We didn’t get involved because we don’t get it.
I get it. I’ve tried all their methods. Some have use but only after the basics have been mastered. That’s what the teachers say (those that dare to speak out).
What kind of a school system are we running here?

The lattice method is not MI but it is confusing and not scalable.
By daughter was confused by it until I told her she didn’t need it.

The controversy is about a weak, dumbed down program that is not producing the promised rewards being pushed by a school system more concerned with ego and posturing than what is best for the kids.

I say that I think the “controversy is far more about the parents than the children” and the very next post completely illustrates my point.

Your post is all about how YOU get it, and YOU’ve tried the methods and how angry YOU are at the school system. The only time you even mention your child is to say that one math concept confused her. Wow, a child confused by something in math? That’s certainly never happened before!

This isn’t about the kids at all. It is about a bunch of adults who didn’t like that they were told they weren’t in charge, so they are throwing a hissy fit and taking up time and resources that should be going to serve all of our children. (Like my three, to answer your question.)

Math Investigations isn’t dumb; it is far more advanced conceptually than “traditional math.” And the shortcuts you are so in love with are the definition of watered-down.

God forbid anything should ever change, right? God forbid your kids try to do something that YOU don’t know how to do. God forbid you support your child and her school by trying to help her learn something you didn’t learn. People like you always manage to hold up progress, but you almost never manage to stop it.

Pompus aren’t you. This is exactly the kind of exchange that your teachers indulged in at the board meeting.
I say “I get it” because the main argument against the parents is that they don’t get it.

My son got what he is doing in 2nd grade when he was in kindergarten and the school hasn’t advanced him. They are not being challenged and abuse from you is not changing that.
The adoption process was floored in many ways and now the math dept is bullying the teachers into supporting them. Sad day.
And since you’re bound to question it further, the opening speaker was a pro-MI advocate who has made a lot of money out of PWC on training classes, one parent on the committee was bullied into agreeing with the math dept, the adoption of 5th grade broke Virginia regs because it isn’t state approved and the FOIAs on that one have been continually dodged.
Quit hiding behind the rhetoric and do what is right for our kids. Choice gets all sides what they want.
What are you afraid of?

There is nothing new or revolutionary about the lattice method. It’s a terrific way to help students understand the steps involved in multiplication. Again, it’s all about number sense.

http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/52468.html

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/LatticeMethod.html
(important take away from this website: “Although the process at first glance appears quite different from long multiplication, the lattice method is actually algorithmically equivalent.”

And by the way, “progress” is how we ended up with the modern math mess of the 70s.
Progress for the sake of doing it differently is not progress.
So many experts say you can’t teach conceptual math until they have the basics. If they can’t add to 20 without taking off their socks, too much time is taken up teaching the simplest of concepts.
You are wasting resources dealing with parents because you did an awful job with the adoption process and a worse job implementing it and responding to the complaints from teachers and parents.

Ha. I love these parents constantly calling MI dumbed down. Ask yourself which is harder, memorizing 4×4 is 16, 4×5 is 20, 4×6 is 24 or figuring out how to work a lattice method. As soon as your kid got confused, you decided the program was dumb. Hm. Also, from your posts and your website I think maybe you all should spend a little less time worrying about math and a little more worrying about spelling and grammar. Yikes.

And an interesting video:

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/326185/the_best_multiplication_method/

The traditional algorithm we learned can get confusing for kids just learning double- an triple-digit multiplication because they have to remember to keep the numbers aligned in descending columns as they multiply each number. My kids (when they were in fourth and fifth grade) inevitbably got confused and frustrated when they would forget why to use a “0″ as the place value holder as they shifted columns when multiplying the second and third digit. It made no sense to them, no matter how many times I’d try to explain to them that the number they were using to multiply the top number was in the “tens” spot, so they had to remember to put a “0″ down in the “ones” spot before they even started multiplying. With the lattice method, kids HAVE to consciously be aware of the fact that they are separating and placing values in the hundreds, tens and ones places. That will make the traditional algorithm that much easier to learn when the eventually do. And they will.

Then it was badly explained to my 5th grader as she had no idea why she had to learn it and couldn’t follow it.
Thing is, those that oppose MI agree with better explanations and conceptual understanding but we don’t agree that MI is a suitable core text. It’s ok as a supplement but it does not teach mastery of anything. Concepts without the practice is not sufficient.

Calling it “blended” does not make it so. That’s just one of the strategies TERC recommends to school systems when the holes start to appear as they have done in many districts; including ours.

Okay, “Sceptical,” calm down. I’m not sure who you think you are talking to with all you “your teachers” and “you did an awful job with the adoption process.”

I am a parent, with two children in elementary school and one starting this fall. Are you just so preprogrammed with your talking points that you can’t relate to another parent? Not everyone is a mean, ogre of a school administrator, trying to lay waste to your child’s future. I’m just a parent who disagrees with you.

I think that math, and early education, is about building the blocks of future success. I think this can be best done using the knowledge gleaned from advances in what we know about how children think, and how they learn. I think it is progress to make changes to better accomodate what years of scientific and cultural study show us.

You think math, and early education, is about meeting the same timetables of learning you met as a child, and scoring well on (arbitrary) state assessment tests.

You aren’t going to convince me you are right (mostly because you can’t seem to string two coherent sentences together – oh, but is that “pompus”?). And I am obviously not going to change your mind. So let’s just agree to disagree. Now, back to your jihad.

Skeptical: Then let your daughter watch the video. It really does break it down pretty clearly, and it’s not any more complicated than the traditional algorithm, with all those descending columns and zeros.

I didn’t get lattice at first, either. Then, again, I was one of those kids who cried at the kitchen table some 40 years ago when my father would try to explain the traditional multiplication and long division algorithms to me. The lattice strikes me as more logical and straight forward.

Ok, we watched the video and that is how she was taught it.
It doesn’t have any proof of why it works or how to connect it to the standard algorithm.

I don’t see what it gives you. Multiplying by parts is ok as an explanation but it shouldn’t take 1 or 2 years to progress from that to the standard algorithm.

And to J mobely, if you know your times table, you don’t have to work it out every time such as doing long division (which MI doesn’t agree with you learning by the way).
Learning simple arithmetic makes so many things quicker to work out.
I didn’t write the web site but you try teaching math to your kids, holding down a demanding engineering job, campaigning against a nuckle-headed school system and maintaining the web site; it’s a lot of work.
Thankfully, the 1528 people on the petition appreciate what we are doing for their kids.

Alanna,

I’m not supplementing with any workbooks, nor do I plan to in the future. I’ll admit that MI is requiring a huge shift in my thinking of how math should be taught, and there have been some WTF moments for me, as well.

I’ve registered to attend the PWCS February workshops for parents on multiplying and dividing. I had to work with my older kids at math at home when the PWCS had a tradtional curriculum, and I expect to do it with this child and MI. It will help if I know how she’s being taught. In all honesty, I struggled mightly trying to do homework with my older kids (now in HS and college) when they were learning with PWCS’s traditional math curriculum. Many a night I cursed those mathbooks for what Ithought were ridiculous homework pages and busy work that gave my kids an increased understanding of absolutely nothing.

And I’m pretty sure our kids won’t be drawing lattices in middle and high school. It’s a teaching tool that, in my household at least, has eliminated a lot of frustration with learning double-, triple- digit multiplication. If my D can move on to using the traditional algorithm with a better understanding of how it works and how to do it, well, I’ll consider that a success.

The PWC math department is not a bunch of bullies. Because they don’t roll over and play dead doesn’t make them bullies. They have to do what they feel is right for all the children. Parents are just interested in their own child. That is how it should be.

Those kids who know various methods of doing arithmetic will be those who are your better mathematicians at higher levels. Those who can think problems through will be your students who are able to use a variety of methods to solve problems including non-routine problems.

Those who go on to get jobs in the real world where math is a heavy component will need to know a variety of methods of solving problems. They definitely will not be solving page after page of algorithms. Algorithms end up being the old monkey analogy: You give enough monkeys enough typewriters they are bound to spell a word.

It wont matter really for the brighter kids. How about all those average and below kids who just might have to understand math to graduate? That’s why the teachers care so deeply.

I’m with you Alanna – my concern with Investigations has always been that it provides students with a multiple different strategies for solving problems with insufficient practice to master any of them. And the only strategies Investigations specifically excludes are the standard algorithms, which are the only processes which are both efficient and effective no matter how complicated the equation.

Part of the reason I support the opt in for traditional math is out of respect for parents, some of whom have posted above, who believe Investigations is sufficient for their children. I just happen to disagree and believe that it is not academically rigorous enough to provide the skills my children need. I don’t want to take anything away from anyone, but I think my children deserve the same right to learn as do their children.

An alternate track would provide parents with the power to choose how their children are taught mathematics and with what materials. If you choose Investigations for your children then great, they will be taught with Investigations. And if you choose an alternate program for your children then they will be taught with alternate materials.

I’m sorry but they are bullies. Any teacher who didn’t teach their way was in deep you know what. They have eased up because they have had to but that’s how Dr W works and the attitude comes down from the top.
Casual observer, I’m glad it works for you; we are asking for a choice not the elimination of MI. The math dept will not listen to people who are in the real world doing complex calculations on a day to day basis. I do use a calculator when doing hex arithmetic but most conventional arithmetic I do in my head or with the standard algorithms.
If MI included practice with more problems, it wouldn’t be so bad.
If it didn’t make such ridiculous statements about the dangers of standard algorithms, it wouldn’t be so bad.
Why are they so afraid of giving us a choice that they bully dozens of teachers into turning up at a board meeting in their free time; most said “thanks for inviting me”. It was citizen comment time not an invitation; who invited them? The whole thing stunk.

If they were from outside, that is not allowed without permission from the board.

The opening parent was in support of MI so who did all the inviting?
It really was ridiculous.

Why are the math dept. afraid of offering choice?

I’m not absolutely sure, but I believe the teachers who spoke were all also PWC residents.

From what I’ve heard the inviting was email directive sent from the PWCS central office staff to Principals and forwarded from there “inviting” teachers to speak in defense of Investigations. There were even coordinated efforts to get the students to sign banners stating ‘I Love Math Investigations” and reports of Principals appealing to the students to tell their parents how much they love Investigations. I’ve heard rumors that at one school the teachers who spoke at the board meeting were given a casual dress Friday while the other teachers were told they could not wear jeans.

The math people in central office are not bullies. On the other hand, they have been charged with the duty of planning the best way to teach the curriculum. This is where the debate is…what is the best way. The math supervisor and her staff look at all 13 years of public math instruction, and where all 73,000 students are going in math. She is familiar with state requirements as well as where our brightest and best are going.

One of the problems is that kids race to get into algebra in 8th grade, then don’t go as far in math as they should be going, often stopping or floundering at algebra II. Math sense and concepts seem to run out.

5-10% of the kids will learn and go on to higher math classes with ease, regardless of what program they take. Great if your kid is in that sub group. If I had a kid in the program and did not like it, I would just give them extra work at home, same as if I thought they were not being taught reading correctly or if they had a teacher that just was not the teacher for them. If I wasn’t comfortable doing that, I would get a tutor. Many parents do that and have done that for years.

It is unreasonable for parents to expect the entire implementation of the curriculum to change because they do not like it. Sceptical, it is difficult to run 2 different programs in the building. Elemetary scheduling is already a nightmare without that. There aren’t enough kids and teachers to offer options.

They managed two programs when they introduced MI without even telling the parents..
And I’m sorry; they are not interested in the bright students, they only want to increase the SOL pass rate so he can move on to a bigger district.

The advance pass rates for 3rd grade stayed flat while 4th, 5th and Fairfax even Stafford showed significant gains.
They can’t even manage to increase the base SOL rate. The only reason it didn’t drop is most teachers abandoned MI for the last 2 months to get ready for the SOL.

I’ve heard rumors that at one school the teachers who spoke at the board meeting were given a casual dress Friday while the other teachers were told they could not wear jeans.

You seriously believe this? You believe professionals would publicly address a school board because they would be allowed to wear casual dress on Friday while the rest of the staff did not?

You mention “rumors” and “reports” (really just another word for rumors). If you’re going to make such outrageous statements, you really should have proof.

For all those MI fans out there, why oh why has it been thrown out of district after district?
Why is it being thrown out of even Dr. Walt’s old district and there wasn’t even a parent group complaining there! It was the Greece School system that wanted a new text book, not the parents. Maybe it is because they dropped to the bottom in math and they’ve had the program for 8 years.

Casual Friday varies from school to school. I seriously doubt a county mandate came down from on high over it. Furthermore, the math department does not set dress policy.

Yes, PWC schools does care about bright kids, Sceptical. Whatever makes you think they don’t. Have you checked the upper level course offerings?

As for the SOL scores, yes, all schools had better be real concerned about their pass rate as well as their annual yearly progress. To even question why shows a clear disconnect as to what is considered important nation wide regarding education. Check out the requirements of NCLB. Most school systems prefer to not have schools that have not made annual yearly improvement. It is the main focus of every school in the USA.

Finally, the 3rd graders did not do worse than last year. 2005-2006 pass rate 91%,
2006-2007 pass rate 90%. 2007-2008 pass rate 90%.

I think that is wonderful. However, it is probably not much of an indicator of how good of a program MI is. It is really too soon to tell. What you need to follow are the math scores in 6, 7th grades. You will be drawing a deep breath as you walk away. While you are at it, check out the surrounding areas in 6, 7th grades. The pass rates are extremely low. Kids do not know how to do problems solving.

Don’t take my word for it: Go to report card/division

https://p1pe.doe.virginia.gov/reportcard/

Regardless of which method is used for math in elementary school, your child will learn math. Many a kid has graduated high school without knowing the multiplication tables. With any luck, some old bitch in 6th grade will make them learn them anyway. Let the algorithms begin.

My parents ALWAYS supplemented in math when I was a child. We practiced math facts nightly.

It kills me to see parents who are PISSED OFF that they have to supplement at home.

MI does teach math facts. And math fact memorization. But just like when I was a kid, the facts won’t be memorized until they are practiced nightly for brief periods of time.

So many of you are “appalled” that you have to give worksheets and practice skills at home with your kids — this is should give you great SHAME.

Do you not remember all of the teaching and supplementing YOUR parents did?

Kids never did learn 100% of what they needed to learn during 6 hours of school. Practice happened at home. But then again, parents back then weren’t running like maniacs from soccer, to tae-kwon-do, to girl scouts, to board meetings with a pitstop at McDonald’s in between. Instead they were at home most nights – working with their kids.

When I grew up, the parents didn’t need to supplement because the teachers new how to differentiate and gave the brighter kids harder problems.
NCLB has not helped schools to improve but that is anther subject.
1% is not statistically significant. The flat advance pass compared to 4th grade 40% to 47% and 5th grade 50% to 58% is very telling.
In a class of 25 to 28, the teacher can’t get around to everyone’s solution and can’t keep the brighter kids entertained.
We are upset because if you complain, you get an annoying lecture about how it’s helping them understand the numbers better. Well we haven’t seen any evidence of that. They can’t work things out on their own and they can’t do it in their heads; they are confused.

Did last year’s 4th graders not study math using Investigations? Their scores are increasing for both proficient and pass advanced. You cannot compare one year to the next. Much has to do with objectives at that grade level. Check out the differences in 6,7,8. Different objectives, different tests.

Scep, it would probably be a good idea to not rely on SOL testing to prove your point. SOL test scores don’t really address the issues you are trying to so desperately to illustrate using data. I don’t think you are going to be able to use empirical
evidence with the tests that are available.

Finally, most kids do not do well with programs they know their parents hate. I hope your child does not know how you feel about this program. The children I have talked to who learn using Investigations seem to love it. I think any time kids are engaged and participating in math rather than sitting and pushing a pencil they enjoy it more. Just an observation.

I am not relying on SOL scores; I’m using them as one indicator. Last year’s 4th graders did not study with MI as far as I know but then I’m not in the math department.
I know the 5th graders didn’t.
One year to the next is only useful for spotting trends. MI didn’t go up; 4th, 5th, Stafford rd and Fairfax 3rd all went up by roughly the same amount.

I think the excessive testing is very disruptive to the learning process; but it is an indication of a problem.
I didn’t start looking at SOLs or any other evidence until my son complained of being bored in math and his math recall shows serious depredation over his 1st grade year.

To my knowledge Investigations was not used in Grade 4 countywide last year. It may have been used in a handful of schools, but the official implementation timetable had it rolling to 4th grade this Fall.

The rules regarding inclusion of LEP students changed recently and the drops noted in pass rates for math from Spring 2006 to Spring 2007 might be attributable to that change. In the past LEP students were granted a one year waiver from having their SOL scores count in the school districts overall scores. That changed and LEP scores were included in the overall Math scores for Spring 2007. So comparing 2006 to 2007 or 2008 is kind of like comparing apples to oranges.

Unfortunately test scores are one of the criteria used to assess the effectiveness of a program of study. We have only had one year of test scores to compare and the results are neither a smoking gun nor a glowing halo.

From what I’ve gathered, parents aren’t complaining about having to do additional work with their children at home. They’re complaining about not being able to do additional work at home with their children because what they teach at home isn’t supported under Investigations.

I have to say that the finger pointing and nasty comments are a bit disappointing. We all have our children’s best interests at heart. We all want them to succeed and to be happy. Can’t we approach the discussion from that standpoint rather than pointing fingers and demeaning one another?

I wish we could; did you hear the board meeting?

What most of us complain about is a lack of rigor; not enough practice. I can follow their strategies but don’t agree with withholding standard algorithms so long and expect more practice problems.

Unfortunately if we complain we are met with ridicule and bullying by those in official positions.
If they agree to a real choice, that solves it. I don’t know what they are afraid of.
They managed 2 programs at many schools when they rolled out MI ahead of the adoption process.

“When I grew up, the parents didn’t need to supplement because the teachers new how to differentiate and gave the brighter kids harder problems.”

I would love to know when this utopia existed …

As far as I can recall, parents have ALWAYS had to practice skills with their kids at home, if they wanted them to be proficient.

I know my parents worked with me. I know my parents’ parents worked with them – in fact, I remember the lectures from my parents that this is what involved and responsible parents did – and that I should stop complaining about it!

This was Europe. My European relatives are amazed at the work parents put in here to achieve such mediocre results. They don’t even do homework there until 11 years old.

Throughout this discussion (here, and at citizen’s time), those who want the PWCS Board to implement an opt-in to a traditional math program for their children have stated over and over that those families who have had success with MI need not worry because they have no desire to see MI removed from PWC schools. They say all they want is a choice for their own children.

Today I visited the website for the petition Alanna linked to:

http://www.petitiononline.com/123math/petition.html

I noted two very specific stated goals in the petition:

For the benefit of our children, our school district, and our community, we, the undersigned parents and citizens of Prince William County, Virginia, hereby formally request PWCS remove “Investigations” from PWCS core elementary mathematics instruction. We specifically request that PWCS:

• Stop adoption and/or further implementation of “Investigations” beyond the current 2007-2008 school year.

• Remove “Investigations” as the core PWCS elementary math program no later than the start of the 2008-2009 school year.

And then there’s this declaration at http://www.pwcteachmathright.com/:

NEWS FLASH!! – on Feb 4, 2009 the PWCS Board will vote to suspend the further implementation of “Math Investigations” into next year’s 5th Grade classrooms. The specific language of the Board meeting agenda item reads:

Investigations in Number, Data, and Space Textbook Series (Johns):

Recommendation: That the Prince William County School Board direct the Superintendent that the textbook series “Investigations in Number, Data and Space” shall not be used as the primary textbook for 5th Grade instruction, but materials in the series may be used to supplement the currently approved 5th Grade textbook. (http://66.23.136.24/)

Please e-mail and/or call the Board members and ask that they support choice in math and that they stop the Grade 5 “Investigations” implementation for next year!

Translation: The goal of the petitioners is to cease implementation of MI after grade 5, and to have a traditional text book adopted as the primary source for 5th grade.

My child will be a fifth grader next year. If MI is not the primary curriculum in 5th grade, what will be? And why would the county continue to invest in MI? My child has had good success with MI. She’s bright and loves to be challenged (parents who support traditional math cannot lay exclusive claim to that descriptor) across the curriculum. She’s a member of her school’s 24 Team, which practices once a week after school, and she was selected to represent her school at the PWCS 24 Competition at Godwin Middle last year. Bright kids are having success with MI. She’s in Signet, which I say only because it appears that there’s now an assertion being put forward that MI is not enough for bright kids. It’s plenty enough. Frankly, I cannot for the life of me understand how anyone can walk into an MI classroom and not come away with a deep appreciation for how those kids are learning math and how they are learning to express themselves mathematically. Listen to an MI kid — whose parents are fully vested in the program — explain to you how they’ve solved a problem, or different ways they could have solved the same problem. You’ll see a math literacy that “traditional” math simply doesn’t instill.

To date, 1521 parents have signed the anti-MI petition. After months of publicity, controversy, and outcry; after countless PWCS board meetings and citizens’ times where both pro- and anti-MI parents have had the opportunity to speak out (all of which are are aired on PWCS TV multiple times over the two-week period between meetings); after a very public attempt to have MI pulled from PWCS, all that work has realized a total of 1521 signatures. That’s it.

I was a parent representative from our school at one of the County’s very first MI parent/teacher workshops a few years ago. It was an evening program at Hylton or Forest Park HS (I’m always confusing those schools), and the auditorium was filled to capacity with parents and teachers. Mrs. Knight took great pains to introduce the MI curriculum to us, and it was very hands-on. Every single parent and teacher who attended the workshop that night left absolutely thrilled that MI was coming to PWCS. After that, I attended “Family Math Night” at my child’s school two or three times every school year and, again, Mrs. Knight and Mrs. Stopko were there with power points, and answered every parent’s questions until there were none left. She asked kids to come up to the overhead projector, gave them a grease pencil, and asked them demonstrate how they would solve a problem using MI. Kids couldn’t wait to get up there and show what they knew to a cafetorium filled with parents and teachers. Parents and kids were given problems along with different MI materials and asked to solve them together. I’ll be honest and say that some kids struggled with some of the problems, but the cool thing was that other kids jumped in to help them and there was typically a “eureka” moment when a kid (or a parent) finally got it.

Some of the people who have been participating in the discussion over here have also been over on the bvbl. Here, they say they are all about “choice” for their kids; over at bvbl, they are asking how they can recall Don Richardson, or put the PWCS School Board back under the authority of the BOS. I ask: Do you really want Corey Stewart and John Stirrup picking school board members or having any influence at all over school policies? When I moved here back in the late-1980s, members of the school board were actually appointed by the County Supervisor for their district. Fortunately, that policy ended not long after we arrived because parents pushed for an elected school board.

“Sceptical” (and I apologize if you’re not the same “Sceptical” who has posted here) said on bvbl:

Perhaps the budget will be the thing that kills MI.
As long as the end result is a better math education, it doesn’t matter.

That statement acknowledges what we all know to be true: In this budget cycle, the board will not be able to fund two separate math programs in every PWC elementary school. At least you’re honest about that, “Sceptical.” So you’ll understand why I am very skeptical about your true colors when you (and others) say you all you want is for every parent in PWC to have a choice as to how their child learns math.

Because, clearly, the agenda goes way beyond that.

I’m not sure the teach math right people have interpreted the grade 5 agenda item correctly, at least based on what you put here and how I interpret it. Right now the officially approved text for Grade 5 is SFAW ; next year it will be Investigations. So either I’m not sure the agenda item is to related to next year, it could apply to those schools which are using MI in 5th grade now, but I have no clue. I just think the excitement might be misplaced.

It doesn’t seem to matter much, anyway, because I just went to the PWCS web site and looked for that agenda item to see if it was clarified at all and it’s been removed. Perhaps the excitement was premature.

I clicked on the link to the petition in your post and it also says this, “Allow PWCS parents to “opt out” of “Investigations” immediately and be provided with an appropriate traditional mathematics education for their children – in every PWCS elementary school – using either the legacy PWCS traditional core mathematics courseware or any of the top four recommended traditional elementary math text/materials series approved by VDOE (Harcourt Math, Houghton Mifflin Math, Scott-Foresman Addison Wesley Mathematics, or Saxon Math). ”

If I had to guess I’d say the petition is a wish list of sorts and that the strategy of the petitioners has changed since the thing was first drafted. If they get an opt out I can’t see why they’d continue to try to get MI removed as the core program, but that’s just a guess.

I forgot to ask this – I thought MI only went to 5th grade or am I mistaken?

It is the same sceptical. I am acknowledging that MI 5th grade is an expense not yet incurred.
That petition was written a couple of years ago before the choice option was brought up.
You can’t change it part way through.
1500 signatures is a lot considering it’s all word of mouth. The proposal is to re-use the previous text so no additional expense; savings in MI workbook material with some additional admin.

Have you looked into how your child will transition to middle school?
They are using a traditional text; I don’t think your child will be able to switch as easily as the math dept claims. That must be why Connected Math which is not on the 6th grade approved list has started turning up in middle schools.

I have no agenda other than better math for my children.

Yes, MI is only to 5th grade. Math dept says there won’t be any problem transitioning to middle school traditional text as the kids are so good at tackling any problem;
Strikes me as a bit naive.
Connected math is the middle school follow on but that’s only state approved in one grade.
They plan on using it as a supplement but that’s all they’ll tell me.

Sceptical,

How long were the school days in Europe, back in the day? Did you go the same number of days that we go here in the US now?

School year was different without the hot summers. About 5 weeks summer hols, week at half term in October, 2 weeks Xmas, 2 weeks at easter, half term in May. The day was 9 to 3:30 so same length.
Didn’t need snow days. They stream by ability though. That made a big difference because most kids were at roughly the same level in each class.
They experimented with mixed ability for one term and we lost a term. The slow kids didn’t get the help they needed and the advanced kids got nothing done.

Casual Observer, I took noticed people speaking out of both sides of their mouth. Your prior statement was very well said.

I am concerned that there is now a gang of thugs out after Mr. Richardson. I saw the selective video that is being shown on bvbl. That is a perfect example of how to pull out only what you want the viewer to see. Propaganda at its most rudimentary. Its ‘author’ knows that there is more to the story than what he shows, yet he has chosen to once again be deceitful. The ‘author’ was at the meeting until it was over and can clearly be seen in the school board video.

Imagine my surprise to find out comments on youtube under the makeshift video have been disabled. Its author can bash Mr. Richardson and no one has any place to respond.

Isn’t America grand!’

I am also concerned about an escalation against him and Mr Lattin mind you, elected officials should not go off as they did. The rest of the speeches those 2 made were not any better than the snippet included there.
The proponents of more traditional math have tried to maintain proper decorum and not singled anyone out for individual criticism but his comments aimed at us were totally I inappropriate.
I complained to him in an email to the board as I am trying to focus on the issue of maths.

And I don’t think I’m talking out of both sides of my mouth.
I would rather see MI gone. If choice is a way to get my kid back into a more challenging math program, I’ll take it.
As will the 50% of parents who say investigations doesn’t meet their kids needs (and half of the teachers said the same) on the last survey.

I agree ISO. As usual, Greg has to find one person to demonize. Par for the course. Although I did not stay to the end, apparently there was a “walk out” of parents while Mr. Lattin was speaking.

As my child is not in PWC schools, I can only comment on what I have heard and seen from other parents. While I actually agree that children need to understand, concretely, what numbers mean, before they can move on to the abstract, I also believe you must marry the two premises. I heard conflicting comments from various teachers. On one hand you have a school, Porter, that appears to be successfuly doing that exact blend, but then you have other schools that are only teaching MI, there is no dependablity on what you child will be taught.

My child is in Montessori, math is taught by sensorial materials first, but then once the “concept” of numbers is mastered, they transition immediately to the traditional algorithm.

MI can be a supplement. MCPS bought into the Scott/Foresman math curriculum some 4 odd years ago. With that curriculum came MI as a supplement,the MI books, and the MI manipulative sets all came together with the scott/Foresman math books etc. When the Scott/foresman consultant came to give us ideas of what to teach in our classroom, she focused on our supplemental MI program along with the scott/foresman way. Needless to say MCPS has been using MI as a supplement for many years. We have the books for scott/foresman, and the manipulative kits for k-3 MI. MCPS has joined the scott/foresman way and MI with the state TTACS as well. The result is a combination of math techniques that has required the MCPS to develop their own set of math benchmark tests for all grades that adhere to all facets of math curiculums available that they use.

Oh and for all of you who wonder which text book company owns Math Investigations. Scott Foresman does.

The proponents of more traditional math have tried to maintain proper decorum and not singled anyone out for individual criticism but his comments aimed at us were totally I inappropriate.

Are you sure about that? You’ve never heard Mr. Barlow poke at Mr. Lattin and others when he’s spoken at board meetings? He did it again last week, and that’s what provoked Mr. Lattin’s response. He said as much. Should he have responded that way? I’m not sure. I do know that explaining your decision-making process month after month has to get frustrating, and then to have opponents raise the same questions every other week because they think if they ask enough the reality will change. Members of the school board have sat at the dais and heard repeated allegations of malfeasance on the part Supt. Walts and his staff. They’ve been threatened with FOIA requests and been forced to listen to one conspiracy theory after another. I read the parent blog in Greece, NY. I saw the nonsense that was posted up there last summer, and I noted that those flames were fanned from all the way down here in PWC by people opposed to MI. If I, a humble parent with a decent google skills, was able to find it, you can be sure other parents and school board members have read it as well.

Like I said, the agenda has moved way beyond MI, or at least it has for the leaders of the movement.

Neither Lattin nor Richardson is my representative, and I’ve never had much agreement with either one’s politics, but I think they’ve been good, principled school board members. I think that’s true of every member of the PWCS Board. I wish the BOCS functioned with half the professionalism and integrity.

I do agree with Mr. Nicholson that it’s time to move on. Enough debate. The decision to adopt MI came after proper consideration and according to PWCS rules and procedures. I think Mrs. Knight’s energies are better focused on implementing programs and workshops to help families understand MI and help them to understand how their children are learning — as she has been doing throughout this debate.

The school board cannot allow 1521 people to determine instructional methods. If that happens, I can guarantee that the next time science textbooks are reviewed we’ll have people petitioning for separate classrooms where their children can learn creationism. It will happen.

I hope we can put the rumor mongering and nastiness aside as we move forward. Perhaps we can focus our efforts on an issue I’m sure most parents of middle and high school students can get behind: A proposal to change the grading system, as happened last week in Fairfax County.

http://www.fairgrade.org/default.aspx

Now that Fairfax has adopted a more traditional HS grading system (80-90=B; 80-90=A), Prince William County’s grading system is even more unfair. Here, 93-100 is an A. That hurts our kids when they apply to colleges, and I’ve experienced that first hand. Transcripts don’t record a student’s average in a class, so colleges only see that a student had a B in, say, AP History. What they don’t see is that student had a 90, 91 or 92 average — which would be an A just about anywhere else. My HS senior was shut out of a merit award for one of her top pick colleges last week because of that policy. She was accepted, but wasn’t offered a merit scholarship that could very well have gone to an applicant from another district with virtually the same grades but a different grading scale.

That’s a policy I’m happy to debate with the school board!

Casual Observer, what a wonderfully written comment. I agree with everything you have said. I wish I could be half as eloquent as you have been.

You are right about PCW’s grading system needing to change. The first place it needs to change is to shore up the grading system and make it consistent from at least 4th grade on up to 12th. Unfortunately, too many students get into a horrible habit of not doing work. The zeroes don’t seem to hurt their grades that much, until 8th grade. If that habit of zeroes becomes well-entrenched, and what wouldn’t in 8 years, then the student is often doomed to a high school life of F’s.

The school board was approached again 5 years ago about making the grading system consistent. A few principals nixed the idea and insisted on keeping the 4 point system through grade 7. Let’s hope someone will take up the cause again and make the corrections suggested by Casual Observer and also make the county grades consistent for elementary and secondary students. The kids will ultimately be the winners.

I’m sorry, but it wasn’t adopted in accordance with Virginia law and that’s why the FOIA requests happened. They are not a threat; just an attempt to find the truth.
Ruth Parker who only advocates for MI kicked off the text selection process which is meant to be unbiased.
MI is not approved at 5th grade so the selection process must be approved by the board or it cannot be used as the primary text.
One parent reviewer is also a PWCS employee.

I am not Mr Barlow and I speak for myself. Mr Lattin showed no restraint and attacked all on his side as did Mr Richardson.

And it’s not 1521 people; it’s half the parents and teachers according to the math departments own survey. And I did say “tried to maintain proper decorum”. I can understand the frustration level when you present evidence of failure or wrongdoing only to be told to sit down and shut up every time.
Thankfully, some board members have started doing their own research and are figuring out that something smells fishy.

Causal Observer,
So you’re concerned about what letter gets assigned to a subject your child takes, but not concerned about whether they actually learn the subject matter? It bothers you because of dollars and opportunity missed at college. How about opportunities in LIFE that are missed because of a substandard education?
This MI debate for me is primarily about the content and delivery of the program. Any math program that “teaches” addition and subtraction of fractions without teaching the concept of least common denominator is missing a critical skill. What’s worse is that it is intentional! The authors come from a school of thought that 7ths and 9ths never occur in the real world (never mind figuring out the portion of workdays in a week or infielders on a baseball team, or any other example you want to come up with), so it’s only important that they know “friendly” fractions. How shortsighted is it that they believe they know what fractions every children will need to know for the rest of their lives! That ranks right up there with the quote from Beyond Arithmetic “In the Investigations curriculum, standard algorithms are not taught because they interfere with a child’s growing sense and fluency with the number system.” (The current edition gives scant treatment to the standard algorithms and the PWC staff, after much criticism of their support of Investigations lack of these algorithms, apparently has relented somewhat to supplement with teaching of standard algorithms, but at a later grade level than recommended by the NCTM). The program overly stresses concept development without the corresponding skill development.
I am also concerned about the delivery of a program that encourages students to talk about math “in their own language” (standard terminology is critical … what if we all went around deciding what we should call a “bear”, common terms are essential to communication) and discover their own ways of solving problems. This approach to learning is time consuming and error prone (with one teacher covering a class of 20+, it could be a while before a child is corrected). Yet to say that that’s all the program is, is incorrect. You mention lattice multiplication. Certainly students don’t come up with that on their own. That needs to be taught, why not do the same with the standard algorithm? Why doesn’t that interfere with a child’s developing growing sense and fluency with the number system? It certainly is not error-free, I’ve seen plenty of mistakes from using it, starting with drawing the diagonals the wrong way! And it obscures the concept of place value much more than the standard algorithm. (I don’t mind children learning it, but I my thoughts there would fill many more paragraphs).
The fact that hundreds of mathematicians decry this program (I’m sure there must be one in favor of it, but I haven’t found him) should bother any parent who has a child in it. The fact that the National Math Panel says concepts and skills must be taught concurrently, that curriculum should be taught to mastery, and that challenging practice is needed (any MI parent can tell you that is lacking … sadly it’s lacking from many traditional textbooks too, which might be part of the reason we’re in this mess) are even more reasons for parents to be concerned.
The fact that our math department staff thinks this is a good program doesn’t trump the knowledge of foremost mathematicians. There was a presentation at a board meeting last year where a PWC employee (a gifted teacher I believe) stated that Algebra is all about the study of patterns. She lost all credibility with me right there, yet she went on to talk for at least another 20 minutes. Algebra should primarily be about the study of mathematical operations with variables and the factorization of polynomials (if that hasn’t been watered down). The educational system that has given us MI has also been sold on open classrooms, whole language, ebonics, and (add your favorite educational fad here). Parents are right to be skeptical about MI (especially given the prominence and background of its detractors) when its sole support is coming from the education community.
I have seen much said about opponents of MI which is completely false. MI supporters like to stereotype us and then attack that, rather than confront the issues that we raise. The discontent with this program is much wider and deeper than supporters wish to admit. I certainly hope that the PWC school board provides parents a choice to “opt-in” to traditional mathematics.

Steve Santee

Steve Santee wrote:

The educational system that has given us MI has also been sold on open classrooms, whole language, ebonics,

See that last word in your thought? That’s the moment I stopped reading.

Elena-I’m a huge Montessori enthusiast as well and had it not been for my child’s experiences in a Montessori preschool, I probably wouldn’t have been discouraged by the SLOW pace of the MI program even in a school that does some supplementation. The big problem in my mind is the lack of differentiation. The MI pedagogy believes that children of certain ages are not ready to learn certain materials and it is the policy of the math office to only extend most K-5 students within their own grade level (with MI extensions my child finds tedious). A peer of my child’s in Fairfax has at least four different math groups in their class just as we do with reading groups and works on much more challenging arithmetic problems. Gosh I wish something like this was available to my child here in PWC…

So why don’t you answer my points about the adoption process rather than nit-picking?

Sceptical,
I suggest you go to the PWCS.edu website. You’ll find the .pdf documents to answer your questions there. Then, again, you already knew that.

It’s the same old game. The most vocal opponents of MI continue to hijack the discussion in other directions when they don’t like where they are hearing. Your questions have all been answered throughout the past year, time and time again. I can’t think of a school board meeting that I’ve missed on PWCS-TV since they started using it. I’ve seen every discussion, every presentation, every citizen’s comment. I’ve seen it all. Every question ever asked by those opposed to MI, every challenge and assertion that’s been made against the school board, staff, experts, TERC, the adoption process…it’s all been addressed and answered multiple times.

You may not like the answers you’re hearing, but it’s ridiculous to say your questions have been ignored.

You’ve admitted that you want MI out of PWCS. You won’t even stand by the petition that you’ve been waving around as proof that 1521 parents want choice, when the petition clearly states you want MI out. Oh, you say, that petition was written so long ago…we can’t change it now… but now we want choice…just don’t pay attention to that other stuff… So does the petition even stand for anything anymore? Of course, there is the announcement on your website asking your members to call their school board rep to ask them to support Milton John’s resolution not to adopt MI for the fifth grade. That was posted this week.

You said it yourself: Perhaps it will be the budget that kills MI. We all know that our school system cannot afford two separate math classrooms in every PWCS elementary school. Choice is just a smokescreen. Looks like the next tactic will be to ask Corey Stewart to hold hostage the PWCS budget so that the school board will put into place your group’s preferred instructional method. Your group has even been so kind as to list the textbooks that are acceptable.

Casual Observer – I felt compelled to respond after you stated that all of our questions have been answered. I’ve asked several questions which remain unanswered. Since I asked them in email and you have no way of knowing what I asked, I’ll ask them again and hope that perhaps you’ll be able to provide me with better answers than I received.

My primary question was about balance. I’ve been hearing a lot about how the program is balanced and provides a blended approach to instruction. I’d like to know how the Investigations framework has been adapted to provide blended lessons. I’d like to know which lessons are blended, where the materials which provide the blended instruction come from, and how the Investigations lessons have been adapted to provide blended instruction.

These aren’t complicated questions and the information I requested should be readily available if the program has truly been adapted to provide that blend we keep hearing about. So that you are fully informed, when I asked this question of PWC staff, I was given a link to the Grade 3 pacing guide and then told that my question had been fully answered.

This one has not been answered:
MI is not approved at 5th grade so the selection process must be approved by the board or it cannot be used as the primary text.
It was not so approved.

You would only know that an answer had been attempted if you were in or closely associated with the school system.
An answer was provided in FOIA which was inaccurate and evasive.

And to reiterate what anonymous said; what changed with the “blended” approach.
Nothing as far as I could tell from the work they were doing, the pacing guides etc.

They were doing a “blended” approach from day one; filling in the many areas where MI didn’t meet the SOLs. If anything more changed, that should have been communicated.

“it’s all been addressed and answered multiple times.”

I suspected Casual Observer was an insider but your last posting confirmed it. How would you personally know that the hundreds of questions asked by parents about MI have been answered? I do know that the Math Dept. frequently puts out the information that they have answered all questions, but that is not true. Some of the board members even mentioned last week that all their questions had not been answered.

And when they do answer, the answers are misleading. Example: When the schools were almost pure MI, some parent asks about long division and why isn’t it taught? Answer: It is taught in 4th grade, here is the lesson. Truth: The lesson is one page and the method is described as an alternative method…the way it is worded, the child would be led to think it is an inferior method and that is how the teaching guide refers to it as well. Children aren’t even required to practice that method. So your child is basically being told that long division is not a smart way to solve the problem. But the Math Dept. only holds up the one page lesson and says “see long division is taught”.

The math dept.’s very own favorite speaker, Ruth Parker (who they pay thousands and thousands of dollars to come to talk to teachers and parents) specifically says that long division is the old way and not applicable to today’s education. When I talked to her after the meeting, she said she’d be fine if no child learned long division period. She said the calculators make it unneccessary in the modern world and that the concept was more important.

So you can see parental frustration. Ask a question, and get an answer but you know that it isn’t really the true picture.

Now as far as long division, teachers were teaching it on their own because they had to for the SOLs but pure long division would never be taught at all in any way in 4th grade if we followed pure core Math investigations without the adjustments. I don’t think I am alone when I say I want my kid to know long division.

The other thing that I have become far more angry about is that the Math Dept. fought hard against the blended approach saying it would destroy the MI method. Now they are toting the blended approach as why things are so terrific and almost bragging about how blended they are. How can that be? Only months ago, the blended approach was the most awful suggestion that had ever been given to them. Only months ago, if a teacher was blending, they were monitored and watched and given a talking to. And now teachers come up there and boast about how blended they are.

No wonder people are so mad

excellent comment; now let’s see who changes the subject and picks on your grammar or spelling.

I suspected Casual Observer was an insider but your last posting confirmed it. How would you personally know that the hundreds of questions asked by parents about MI have been answered? I do know that the Math Dept. frequently puts out the information that they have answered all questions, but that is not true. Some of the board members even mentioned last week that all their questions had not been answered.

Are you kidding me?? I can guarantee that you’ve had more contact with the school board and school administration than I’ve ever had. I’ve never even attended a board meeting in person, though I watch every one on television, just as I do the BOS meetings. As I stated earlier, I’ve witnessed every MI discussion, presentation, testimony, citizen comment, citizen question etc. that’s occurred at School Board meetings. I’ve watched representatives from the Mathematics department answer your questions at Board Meetings, at Family Math Nights, at Workshops, and I’ve read everything about MI that’s been posted on the PWCS website — and that includes downloading and reading every .pdf of every report and supporting research that’s been uploaded. THAT’S how I know your many, many questions have been answered time and time again.

The only communication I’ve even had with the board was an email I sent to all of them voicing my family’s support for MI before last week’s meeting. I cc’d Carol Knight. She might recognize my face from some the workshops I’ve attended, but I’ve never introduced myself to her by name and she certainly wouldn’t know my child’s name. I received three generic “thanks for writing” responses from two board members (one board member sent me the same email twice, several hours apart), and a response from Ms. Knight answering two specific questions I asked in my email. But, again, other than an email exchange I had with a gentleman (who previously represented my district) years ago about another matter with one of my children, I’ve never had any contact (email, phone call, meeting, etc.) with another school board member. My current rep wouldn’t know me from Adam. I’m sure he’d know you, though.

The only “insider” information I’ve acquired is that of a SAHM with three children who attend/attended PWCS elementary, middle and HS starting in 1993 and continuing today. I’ve always had an intense interest in my children’s schools and their education. I’ve been volunteering in their classrooms once or twice a week since my oldest (now in college) started k-garten. I did a stint at one school’s PTA board many years ago but PTA wasn’t for me so I dropped after my term was up. I was on the Parent Advisory Council at the same ES many years ago and enjoyed that much more, but that never brought me into contact with anyone from the school board or The Hill. I attended many information meetings back in the mid-1990’s when Dr. Kelly was revising the ENTIRE curriculum. I was there for the whole language/phonics controversy, and I’m here now as the schools introduce MI.

I’m a veteran parent who does her research, that’s it. I’m getting involved in the MI debate because it appears to me that a minority of parents are trying to hijack the process and push their own agenda, with a callous disregard for the reputations they are damaging in the process. I’ll say it a third time: Your agenda has moved way beyond MI. Even a non-insider like me can see that — as long as they know how to use the internet. And who doesn’t in 2009?

I’m no insider. The idea is laughable. But if believing that gives you an excuse to reject any of the points I’ve made, well, I can’t help that. I don’t even know why I feel the need to defend myself, but I do. Thank goodness I’ve never given you my real name or I’m sure I’d be publicly dragged through the mud as well. Just like the secretary at Porter Traditional who had the NERVE to publicly speak in support of MI.

This is nuts. I’m done. But you can be sure I’ll stay involved behind the scenes making my voice heard in support of MI. And I’ll continue to support my children, their schools and their teachers. I’ve done so for the past 15 years and I will until my youngest graduates in 2017.

Ok; sorry for calling you an insider. So how did calling it blended make any difference?
What changed?

Having read your response in more detail, it seems you don’t actually have any kids doing MI so all you know of it comes from the publisher or the math department.

I have experience of both programs and I can assure you, my son learned a lot less in 1st grade than his older sibling, That’s what got me involved and it is the only reason I am involved. You keep talking about a hidden agenda; I don’t have one and I don’t think the others do either.
We all want our Wednesday evenings back; I don’t enjoy public speaking as you will know from the board meetings. As you have seen them all, I’m the English one.

Did you even reading my posts?? I’ve said many times that I have a fourth-grader in PWCS who has been using MI since 2nd grade, and who has had great success.

I will make this as clear as I can.

I have a child in college who attended PWCS from k-12.
I have a senior in HS who has attended PWCS k-12
I have fourth grader who has attended PWCS k-4, and will most likely go all the way through 12 barring any unforseen circumstances.

And, AGAIN, everything I know about MI comes from personal experience as the mother of a fourth grade MI student, as a parent volunteer in that child’s classroom, as well as from attending every MI Family Workshop I could, several math department MI information meetings since the very first one when my youngest was in 2nd grade, watching every board meeting, researching on the internet (at PWCS.edu, MI groups, as well as the sources your group links to).

Read back through my posts and you will see quite clearly what I when I say there is a hidden agenda. Or have you not read bvbl of late?

If you’re going to pick apart my posts at least know what I’ve said!

PS…I haven’t said anything about the blended approach, so I don’t know why you keep asking me to explain or justify the county’s policy.

Sorry, it’s easy to loose track of who has what. Why don’t you calm down.

I have read and posted on BVBLs math investigations page. I understand that he is upset with this representative. I have the same representative and the same qualms about him.

That and math investigations are the only areas where we have crossed. He may have his agenda but I don’t think most of us share that.

We keep asking about the blended approach because nobody can tell us what they changed when Dr Walts came up with the “idea”. I assumed as you seem to know so much more about the educational system in this country and county that you had looked into it.

No offense, and it’s not my place to say this so please forgive me if this crosses any lines, but will you two please cut out the bickering?!

CO clearly believes the program is effective and bases that on her child’s experience and her research into it.

Sk clearly believes the program is ineffective and bases that on her child’s experience and her research into it.

I think that sums the positions up pretty succinctly, although I’m sure you’ll correct me if necessary.

CO – do you believe an alternate instructional track, which your child would not be forced to participate in, adversely affect his / her education? If so, why?

SK – why do you believe an alternate instructional track is the only acceptable alternative?

No offense taken; this is a good time to sum up.

I believe my son along with most of the kids in PWC would benefit from a more traditionally based math education. The previous text was not ideal and some of the explanations in MI are good.
My main disagreement is with their philosophy where they avoid the standard algorithms, regrouping, lowest common denominators etc.
Group thinking/working is ok as an occasional method to get the kids working together but it takes too much time away from mastering math facts and practice at “sums”.

I don’t believe that an alternate track is the only way however, given the maths departments stated belief in math investigations and given that the math department and TERCs guidelines say that MI should not be used piecemeal, I don’t think using MI as the primary text is going to get the results that I am looking for.

The idea of an alternate track only came about because it was made clear that the board would not abandon MI unless something totally dramatic happened to the test results and with the teachers spending the last couple of months before the SOLs gearing the kids up to take them, that is not going to happen.

I have grave concerns about kids that have done mainly MI moving into the traditional middle school program that we have or moving to another school district.

The letter printed on the dark screen shows just how low things get on bvbl. It stands to reason that employees will defend the things they do. It stands to reason that Linda Z would alert people favoring the program.

Does Letiecq have a low point or should we expect him to go lower? This kind of bottom feeding is unacceptable. He toys with careers and charges people in the math department with violating the acceptable use policy. He would be crying and outraged if someone did the same to him.

Actually, he is probably talking to himself. Do any of you all know those new people in the tread that attempts to destroy an employee’s career? Funny how they all just landed in time for yet another session of the politics of destroying others. The tools of learning should not be political. Teachers have every right to support that which they do and feel strongly about.

That’s why most of us have migrated over here to try and have a sensible discussion.
I don’t like the nasty turn the board meeting took and the divide is going to be hard to fix but I am not after anybodies head.

Hi Sceptical, did you get my message about the malfunction? I cannot get those links to come out of the spam folder. I am sorry and I did try. I saw them when someone else complained that theirs didn’t come through. I can force it if you want. Here is what I will require: 1. let me know you are doing it. 2. do 2 posts. leave the links out of one. 3. I will go pick up the links and force them into your post that appears.

Regarding your above remark, we are glad that you feel this is the place to have a sensible discussion. We often don’t all agree, but I think most of us can have a civil discussion. (most of the time)

Sure. There are some more videos on youtube that are less chopped up for political reasons; you might want to add them to your other investigations piece.
Just search for math investigations prince william and you’ll find them.

Elena and Alanna might very well want to do that. They are more directly involved than I am. If there is something you want me to hook on to your post, let me know and I might be able to do it. I know I didn’t explain what happened all that well.