[GCFL-discuss] How Times Have Changed

Wed Feb 25 22:18:26 CST 2009

Good for your mom! ?Calculators were big, rare and expensive when I was
in school, but my current philosophy is, nobody should use a calculator
until they can do basic arithmetic in their head, know multiplication
tables, etc. THEN they can start using calculators when the simple
arithmetic is NOT the point of the exercise, just something that
incidentally has to be done to get to the solution.

Siarlys

On Wed, 25 Feb 2009 13:38:42 -0800 "Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies
List" <gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net> writes:
My mom started teaching again about 8 years ago ("retired" 3 years ago
and then they brought her back for math advisory board for 2 years).
(High School) She had the Algebra 1a & 1b students and Advanced Algebra.
In her time at the High School she became renouned for her refusal to
allow students to use calculators unless they were on the graphing
section of the class, or more dificult parts that require calculators. To
the point students would do everything in their power to transfer out to
the other teacher that allowed them to use a calculator for EVERYTHING.

My brother's sophomore year he walked onto his dorm floor and one of the
freshmen was bad talking his High School teacher. My brother joined the
conversation and asked the kid where he was from... Our High School where
mom was now teaching... Oh ok... he keeps going... his words become ever
more colorful as he describes his Algebra teacher.... then stops, "Why do
you ask?" - "Because you're talking about my mom."  The kid was
petrified!

So yes, I completely feel for you on education these days.
~Lance

On Wed, Feb 25, 2009 at 11:51 AM, Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies
List <gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net> wrote:

Siarlys, 

Re your comment:  "Friends of mine in South Carolina have a grandson the
schools wanted to put on Ritalin a few years ago. He was squirming a lot
in class too. Why?
He finished his work quickly and got everything right, then had nothing
to do. This leads me to the conclusion that ADD stands for Administrative
Deficiency Disorder. If the kid exhausted what you assigned, give him
more work, or something more challenging. When I was in elementary
school, my teachers would tell me 'Go to the library and get a book, come
back here by <TIME>.' No hall passes either -- I ran into that in junior
high school." 

When my son was in kindergarten, I was called in for a parent-teacher
conference. The complaint by the teacher was the my son was disrupting
the class. When I asked how, the reply was that he would sit and make
jokes, or ask the other students what they were doing, or squirm around
in his chair. I asked, "Does he get his work done?" The reply came, "Yes,
he finishes it quickly." I then asked, "And what do you have him do while
the other students are finishing their work?" The reply, "I tell him to
sit quietly and wait for the next activity." I was stunned! This was an
educator of kindergarten students?! Asking a 5-year-old boy to sit still
for up to 10 minutes while his classmates finished their work?! Very
tactfully (that was then; I would not be as gentle now!), I suggested
that she send him to the back of the room with some books, or let him
play at the sand table, or play with puzzles. Her reply, "Why, I couldn't
do that! The other students would want to leave their work undone and go
do what he is doing!" Again, I was stunned! "Okay, give him some extra
work to do. He loves to write stories and draw pictures." Again, the
reply, "But the other children will want to do that, too!" Knowing I was
getting nowhere with her, I went to see the principal. She explained that
this was a first-year teacher, and she (the principal) would work with
her to solve the problem. Gues what the solution was? When he was
finished with his assignment, my son got to go to the back of the room to
read, draw, write stories, etc., and any other student who also finished
her/his work early also got to go to the back of the room for the same
activities. Duuuhhh! 

A week before his first grade year ended, he came home in tears, crying
because he wasn't going to be promoted to second grade because he hadn't
finished his workbook. When I talked with the teacher the next day, she
called my son over, apologized to him, and explained that he was working
on the third-grade workbook and that he would be promoted. Smart teacher.
Kid finishes his work early, challenge him with more difficult work! 

Our education system is in a very sad state. My husband is a math
instructor at a community/technical college. In order to graduate with an
AA degree, students must pass college algebra. All students must pass the
pre-algebra math course before taking college algebra. Even so, he gets
students who can't multiply or divide simple numbers and have no idea
what to do with fractions. It's frustrating for everybody. Especially the
parents who have to pay the tuition for the student to repeat the course.
My husband is on the advisory committee, and he is trying to get the bar
raised for the pre-algebra class to make sure students can do basic math.
Unfortunately, the "old guard" at the school sees nothing wrong with the
current system in which 30% of the algebra students fail the course and
repeat it one to two times in order to pass it. My husband suggested to
the advisory committee that if a student passes the course with an A or a
B, her/his tuition be refunded. A student on the committee topped his
suggestion with, "Don't refund the tuition, apply it to any other course
the student wants to take the next semester." Gee, there are some
students who really can think! Let's reward them for it. 

kateinmo
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