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OT-Kids Homework-dumbing it down for everybody??

N

Nate V. IA

Member
My son is in 3rd grade, this is the kind of thing they are learning. A couple of weeks ago they were told that instead of using pi, just round to 3. Good luck finding anybody that can do any precision work in 15 years.

P.S. I did make him correct the spelling before he finished and we discussed whether he had a rectangle or a trapezoid (we could not agree, he'll find out tomorrow.)

Nate
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Went through this with my daughters as well. At least now that they are in 8th and 10th they are being forced to correct values for Algerbra

There is hope though slim it may be
 
From what I remember being in school at that age, and what they are trying to teach them now at that age, it looks to me like they are trying to stuff way too much into their minds way too early.

As far as the pi and rounding it to 3, at that age I doubt they have tried to teach them decimals yet, so at worst it gives them insite into the calculation, without making it too complicated.

That said, those of us that didn't get near the 'education' in school that kids now days, are the ones that have brought this country to where it is today.

The biggest difference I see, at least with what they are teaching our daughter in school, is that they have increased the 'complexity' of what they are teaching, but what they have dumbed down to the n'th degree is the basics.......and that's about as DUMB as it can get........
 
In My neck of the woods We learned basically the same thing at that age with the exception of pie. We also learned at that age that if You weren't as advanced as the rest of the class You would just kind of tag along for the ride. Well I was not as advanced nor well-to-do as the rest of the class and was left floundering to fend for Myself while the others excelled and it really pi---d Me off. Now years later I get back at all of them because not one of the crème dela crème knows how to change oil or diagnose a problem with their own vehicles. True I do not give them a hard time BUT all I can think is where would You be without us flunkies that have been looked down upon all these years? And I hope in the future the kids that need a little more help can get it without being brow bashed or earmarked as worthless.
 
My 8th grade daughter is in several of the advanced classes. Algebra 1 in 8th getting high school credit for it, Science, English (Comm Arts as it is called today) and US History.

Other than the History they are actually teaching pretty good stuff in the advanced classes. Now as to the other classes well....

History teacher has her head up her backside. Taught the kids that Japan entered WWII because we stopped selling them oil. Not correct and I had to explain the real reasons. She then did her own research (smart kid) and came back and asked why did she teach it that way and I had to tell my daughter "The No Child Left Behind Act" and the standardized testing.

Let's just go back teaching like they did back when the USA punched out the best. Read, Writing and Math
 
I know that there is a great deal of discussion today that is centered around the "dumbing-down" of our contemporay educational system. Maybe it is true, but I do know a couple of things that give me pause concerning that assertion.

My wife recently retired after 30 plus years of teaching Honors and Advanced Placement High School English. She even taught English in a state university in Georgia for 5 years.

Her courses were much more difficult than the ones that we had when we were in high school in the late 50s / early 60s. If I had attended one of my wife's courses, I would surely have failed it.

My daughter-in-law is a stay at home mom but has tutored high school math students for about 20 years. Her algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and calculus classes (tutoring) are much more difficult than the equivalent courses that I had when I was a high school student.

Maybe more poor students are pushed through the system today than were when we were kids, but it seems to me that the course content is more comprehensive today than it used to be in the 50s and 60s.

I'm not sure.

Tom in TN
 
I think that for 3rd graders the value of Pi is not that important yet.
I remember Pi being approximated to 3.14 or 22/7.
I do not care really because I do not have to use it at work.
That would appear to be stuff a 3rd grader would do, connect the dots to make polygons, triangles, and such.
My 8th grade son is starting geometry, basic and basic algebra too. Basic trigonmetry was last month.
 
Hmm. I don't remember learning about polygons in third grade. I'm not sure we learned about pi, but when we did its value was 3-1/7. Which means you had to have a firm grasp on fractions, which as I recall was in fourth grade.

What I do remember about elementary school math was the hours of mind-numbing long division and multiplication. Fortunately I had a sympathetic teacher in third grade who let me do calculations in my head rather that write everything out, otherwise I would have been poisoned on math forever. As it was, I didn't really hit my stride in math until we got into algebra and geometry in middle school. I suddenly realized I was pretty good at it, after years of hating math.

I don't know whether kids today are getting a better or worse education than we did, but I think it's great they are getting exposed to geometry early. As for "naming" polygons, that seems a bit silly but helps them learn the nomenclature for describing angles (e.g a triangle has three angles: "ABC", "BCA" and "CAB").
 
Quick story about rounding off. We were pouring concrete slabs for tractor trailers to park on when unloading and were way short on concrete. Boss wasn't happy paying for a short load to finish. He had ordered the concrete, when we asked him how he figured it he said length x width x thickness. Slabs were 10" thick, he rounded that to .8 instead of using .833
 
Welcome to EVERY child left behind. I go thru the same thing here with my to boy's. I never realized that a simple math problem took a page of paper to figure out. It amazes them when I can do it in a couple of steps CARRYING THE ONES TO THE TENS COLUMN.
 
So this is a class to teach The Weather Channel announcers?

How to name everything? ;)

Back in my day we had aweful math books. Had us do 4-5 problems, then first showed how to do them. Just aweful. Lost a lot of kids along the way, a whole generation of poor math skills from that series of books. Terrible.

Paul
 
From what I see there is a lot more technology in the classroom than what there used to be. Some of it is good but I question some of it. I wonder how many kids could do calculations using log tables? With the invent of the calculator say goodbye to log tables and the slide rule. Some things stick in your head forever and some doesn't. Here is 2 examples
pi 3.14159...
e the base if the natural logs 2.718281828459045...

Calculations are way easier with the calculator.
Bud
 
When you look to see where the US ranks in the world in education and education spending...make sure that you look at a couple of other things.
1. What is the ranking based on? What worldwide standardized test is being used? Is the material covered in the test covered in all the schools' curriculum?
2. What percentage of the other countries students is the ranking based on? Not all countries (and by that I mean very few) offer the same, mandatory education system for all students. Many other countries weed out lower performing students early and funnel them to different programs and the do not enter into these rankings.
3. When looking at spending, make sure that you consider what is provided and included in these spending figures - not as many other countries feed students breakfast and lunch, offer as many days in school per year. Also consider whether or not the expenditure figures are based on the cost of living in that country.
Finally, consider who published the study.
 
The money being spent on education goes mostly to the administrator and for sports.

Local school district is laying off 120 teachers - but not a single highly paid administrator!
 
You're complaining about the school system being "dumbed down" because they're trying to teach pi in the THIRD GRADE?

I don't think pi was mentioned in a geometrical sense until 5th or 6th grade, and I was in the super-advanced class.

In 3rd grade, the only question about pi was, "Apple or blueberry?"
 
That's for sure !
My kids were pretty much on their own with homework after the 3rd grade ! They were being thought things I never was.
 
(quoted from post at 03:02:24 02/18/15) In My neck of the woods We learned basically the same thing at that age with the exception of pie. We also learned at that age that if You weren't as advanced as the rest of the class You would just kind of tag along for the ride. Well I was not as advanced nor well-to-do as the rest of the class and was left floundering to fend for Myself while the others excelled and it really pi---d Me off. Now years later I get back at all of them because not one of the crème dela crème knows how to change oil or diagnose a problem with their own vehicles. True I do not give them a hard time BUT all I can think is where would You be without us flunkies that have been looked down upon all these years? [b:6834f7b943]And I hope in the future the kids that need a little more help can get it without being brow bashed or earmarked as worthless.[/b:6834f7b943]
Click to expand...

Sadly, the Common Core system does just the opposite. You either get it or you don't those that do, they do fine. Those that don't get advanced with everyone else regardless. That's why we homeschool now. Not something I like or wanted, but when a kid who can't read or spell gets passed upward....
 
I noticed this when my kids (now grown) were in school in the '80s. I was very active in the school district. Argued till I was blue in the face but got nowhere whenever they tried to introduce some "new" way of teaching. Some of the things I went through because some education PHD thought there was a "better way":
- OBE (Outcome Based Education): Doing away with grades and giving kids starting in kindergarten a "portfolio" that would show their cumulative work when they applied to college. :roll: A flash in the pan program.
- Integrated Math: HS math track would no longer be algebra, geometry, trig, calculus. It would be "integrated". This meant they taught freshmen a little algebra, a little geometry, a little trig each year. First year they did it, I looked at the books and told the school board that kids going through it would be confused and have no solid foundation for moving onward. They scoffed at me but the first summer, most of the kids needed summer school and tutoring because they had no clue. My 3 daughters' worst skill set is Math because of it. It was done because of the way the Michigan testing was set up. I.e. it was aligned to get them good scores, not teach them anything. I understand the school system has dropped this method. But not before a bunch of kids "got left behind". Ain't that ironic?

As others said, we used to be tops but we have slid backwards.
 
Third grade math is probably "dumbed down" to match what a third grader can comprehend and put to use. Seventh grade math is more sophisticated, as is high school math, trigonometry, calculus, differential equations, Laplace transforms, etc.

Before calculators had a pi short cut button, a close estimate was 355 divided by 113. It was easiest to remember as 113 backslash 355. It's accurate to seven decimal places. Slide rule accuracy is only good to two decimal places.

I always chuckle a little when Tom Sylva (spelling?) on This Old House says "That's dead nuts, within a thirtysecond". For his industry that is close enough.
 
All you have to do to prove education has gone downhill is question a few college students about history,current events etc the answer will be painfully obvious.Plus Asian students come to US universities and always out perform US educated students.Some West Coast colleges are even considering limiting the number of Asian students because the high number that were more qualified than other students educated here.
 
It all depends on the local school district, I transferred my kids from Mount Vernon to Cedar Rapids due to this.
 
I know exactly what you mean. I went to a local school for the first half of a grade, and I busted my self getting all A's, and there were kids that got D's and F's, and we all moved on like we were all straight A learners!??!

I have been home schooled all of my life (other than the short period above) and the program I am in is actually a Public School, but I can do everything at home. It is kind of neat because I have the freedom to do what I want, when I want, so in my case, I get up at 5, and am done with school by 7 or 8, then I have the rest of the day to be "curious" whether about tractors, trucks, or anything else, and THAT is what is getting me the education that I have...

I think that is very good of you to actually care about the education their kids are getting... LOTS of parents couldn't care less..... Bryce
 
One thing the slide rule did for me was to make me think and reduce equations to the lowest possible terms since the "rule" didn't place the decimal for your. Since most of my day involved calculations and their application, I got pretty good at it. I still have my K&E Deci-lon prominently displayed in my bookcase at home.

Texas Instruments came out with a "Reverse Polish Logic" calculator that worked on adding machine logic and just wasn't suited for scientific work as I needed it.

Hewlett Packard came out with a neat HP 35 and before you knew it a HP 45 full functional scientific calculator. Was $400 and the best money I ever spent. My productivity went up a thousand times......but nobody offered to reimburse me for it directly. However my "non periodic" pay raises more than compensated me.

Funny. Today you can get one 10 x more functionality for $29.99......but that's OK. Glad we are where we are in today's technology.....even though at my age, I let a lot of it pass me by.

Mark
 
Here, my friend, a grade one teacher (6yr olds) is teaching them fractions, geometry and grammar. Most know what 1/2 a cookie is, but can't get their head around what "fraction" of a cookie they get when it's broken into two equal parts. They have trouble with triangular and hexagonal cubes. Not any wonder, since most can't read "see Jane and Jack chase Spot up the hill" or whatever it's current equivalent is. Never mind that in her school, english is a second language for most and a lot of these kids miss weeks at a time when their parents take them back to their country of origin for a two month "holiday" during the school year. I also wonder what idiot(s) are in charge of determining the curriculum. Since her school is low in the grade 3 provincial scores, she's now supposed to teach 2 hours of math to them per day! And then they wonder why our kids don't compare to places like Japan, Germany, Switzerland etc. And she has 20 kids and says "that's a lot". Maybe, given the circumstances. Yet, how did previous generations get so far? All my classes where 30+ students and many of us only learned english once we started school and without any special language education. Same with those generations before. Just makes you shake your head. Heck, preschool, kindergarden, elementary school, middle school, high school, university, ba, ma, phd ----- more and more education, it seems we're getting so smart it's making us stupid. MK
 

I'll try to be tame! Around here teachers of THREE YEAR OLDS are being told they should stand in front of a blackboard and teach them like they are high schoolers. Marilyn used to teach lower elementary and pre school she talks to these teachers and they are frustrated as all get out with what the PHD's in high places are telling them to do to teach our young people. Little kids with minds that have yet to develop are being drilled like they are in high school!!!!! The kids WILL burn out and drop out. Only age will develop our young people's minds, they can't be rushed we cannot change the biological development of their minds by ramming huge amounts of information down their throats. The PHD's look at the VERY FEW three year olds who are able to read the cerial box and they expect every child to do that. What they don't realize is these kids who can read at three years old can't COMPREHEND what they are reading. The PHD's look at countries that have been doing this and their supposed high achievement. What they don't look at is a higher rate of suicides among their young people. We are headed for an educational disaster with a nation of people who have given up on learning at a young age and they will never have the desire again once they lose it. We have many teachers who can't wait till their IPERS is maxed so they can retire. The teachers know what's right, not the ones in the ivory towers. Every Child Left Behind is a very good name for it.
 
This!
I could not have typed a better reply myself.

Some topics being pushed too early and resulting in an artificially high failure rate.
 
I always love it when you see kids in spelling bees, mechanical competitions and geography type things and guess who wins??? Home school. Gotta love it! Our own government is Make a permanent DRONE base class of people. Linden Johnson made some of it possible and something like 4 trillion dollars later poured down a rat hole... I will not go further cause the whole post will get poofed.
 
(quoted from post at 10:08:06 02/18/15) I always love it when you see kids in spelling bees, mechanical competitions and geography type things and guess who wins??? Home school. Gotta love it! Our own government is Make a permanent DRONE base class of people. Linden Johnson made some of it possible and something like 4 trillion dollars later poured down a rat hole... I will not go further cause the whole post will get poofed.
Click to expand...

jeffcat, I never thought I would recommend home schooling to anyone but today I applaud those parents who take the time to keep their kids at home so they can be taught by the old standards.
 
Its a psychological fact. There is an age where you can hand a child a cookie, and he says he wants more than one cookie. You can break the cookie into 3 pieces and he will think he has three cookies. A couple months later he just realizes you broke his cookie. I believe the educational system, like most government system, is trying to be a one size fits all kind of thing. Everyone gets taught the same, and the average is good enough. Except that is not good for the exceptional, or those not as gifted as average. Lowest common denominator type thing. Just my opinion.
 
Just glad I don't have kids. So no need to deal with teachers or education system.
I had parents that were very instrumental in learning. Dad would digress into other areas when working with us in history and geography. Mom was the math and English person.
That common core crap is the workings of socialism to create delinquents in education.
 
Years back I watched a Purdue University professor explain why if a kid could give a good explanation of why 2 + 2 = 6,000 he should be given most of the credit for it. Then a few years ago when my nieces were in school, the school came up with some new formula to show that 2 + 2 = 4, but the formula used wasn't 2 + 2 = 4, it went something more like "4 equals 20 trips to the store, a swim around the pond, a day at the library, minus green beans and a glass of milk at dinner", and if you didn't spell it our like that, you got it partially correct...but if you put down 2 + 2 = 4, you got it 100% wrong.

Yep, the world is upside down, and my nation is in deep, deep, deep...stuff.

Mark
 
(quoted from post at 14:08:06 02/18/15) I always love it when you see kids in spelling bees, mechanical competitions and geography type things and guess who wins??? Home school. Gotta love it! Our own government is Make a permanent DRONE base class of people. Linden Johnson made some of it possible and something like 4 trillion dollars later poured down a rat hole... I will not go further cause the whole post will get poofed.
Click to expand...

You got it exactly. There will be a drone class and a queen class and super queens above them. Common core is all about pigeon holing and administration, not education. It's a mess. It was bad before with mandated courses that no one needs and the stupid experiments in unworkable methods, now it's just pathetic.
 
Yeah I had an "instructor", would not dare show him the courtesy of referring to him as a professor, adjunct or otherwise, give a C just for showing up for the final exam in my 3rd semester Calculus class. Obviously had no respect for him.

Mark
 
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