The Changing Way That Math Is Taught To Children

from the carry-the-1 dept

NPR has a fascinating story about how the methods for teaching basic mathematics have been changing in schools. For example, they show the following comparison for teaching multiplication:

The Way We Used To Multiply

The old way to multiply required a student to add the products of 36 x 4 and 36 x 2. The trick is to add that 0 at the end of the second product. How Kids Learn To Multiply Now

These days, students add four products to get the answer.

This fascinates me because I was definitely taught that first method as a kid, but what really gets me is that I ended up teaching myself the second method, because it seemed like a fun trick that made it easier to multiply larger numbers in my head (shocking news: I was a bit of a nerd). But once I had taught myself the latter method, I could never figure out why that wasn't more common. Apparently, I was just ahead of my time.

The other interesting thing that hit me was the article's explanation for why things have shifted:

"That's largely to reflect the different needs of society," he says. "No one ever in their real life anymore needs to -- and in most cases never does -- do the calculations themselves."

Computers do arithmetic for us, Devlin says, but making computers do the things we want them to do requires algebraic thinking. For instance, take a computer spreadsheet. The computer does all the calculations for you automatically. But you have to write the macros that tell it what calculations to do -- and that is algebraic thinking.

"You cannot become good at algebra without a mastery of arithmetic," Devlin says, "but arithmetic itself is no longer the ultimate goal." Thus the emphasis in teaching mathematics today is on getting people to be sophisticated, algebraic thinkers.

So for all the times kids claim that they shouldn't need to learn mathematics because they'll never need aspects of it in real life, it's nice to see that the education system is actually adapting to make the process of how you think about math much more practical in today's world.

Filed Under: education, math, teaching

DailyDirt: Teach Your Children Well

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Teachers don't have an easy job, but at least they get the summers off (in the US). Technology might be able to help improve things by increasing the amount of teacher-to-student attention time, but investments in classroom technology are also competing for pretty limited resources. It's a tough problem to solve, and here are a few interesting links about education and the American school system.

• The Khan Academy is developing some really cool software to help kids learn more effectively and efficiently. And it'll be really cool when the Khan Academy starts training anyone on how to create lessons for anything.... [url]
• Bill Gates is concerned that federal and state budget deficits are going to squeeze education investments pretty soon. No solutions are presented by Mr. Gates in his talk, but the Gates Foundation does have a mission to help improve education in the US. [url]
• Toledo teachers have a peer review system that helps identify which teachers are good or bad. However, the effectiveness of this system is still debated. [url]
• To discover more interesting education-related content, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

Filed Under: bill gates, education, khan academy, new math, teachers

Khan Academy Embraces BitTorrent

from the nice-to-see dept

We've written a few times before about the Khan Academy, the free online education resource, started by a former housemate of mine, that has turned into a powerhouse in the online education space. I had lunch with Sal a few weeks ago, and he's got some really fascinating things planned for Khan Academy that go way beyond what's there now. If you think it's disruptive to the educational space, you haven't seen anything yet. The latest move by the organization is to team up with BitTorrent to make it even easier and more efficient to spread the educational videos. They're doing this via the BitTorrent app studio platform, which is a development worth watching. The core of BitTorrent has always been the underlying infrastructure it provides, and the company is clearly moving towards enabling others to build a lot more on top of that infrastructure. As more and more people begin to realize the power of BitTorrent as infrastructure, we should start to see a lot more interesting apps come out of it. So this collaboration seems like good news for both sides, with two companies doing very interesting and disruptive things...

Filed Under: bittorrent, education, infrastructure
Companies: bittorrent, khan academy

Hurt Locker Producers Demand Sanctions Against Lawyer Offering DIY Legal Kits

from the completely-insane dept

We've discussed in great detail the efforts by Voltage Pictures, the producers of the movie Hurt Locker to sue thousands of people for sharing the movie. Well, "sue" should be used loosely, as the effort, coordinated by US Copyright Group (really DC law firm Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver), is really about demanding people pay up to avoid getting sued. We also wrote about a lawyer, Graham Syfert, who was offering (for sale) a DIY legal kit for individuals on the receiving end of such a lawsuit, who couldn't afford a lawyer. Apparently a bunch of folks have used those legal forms to make pro se filings -- and apparently some of them are working. The motions to quash have gone nowhere, but motions to dismiss are apparently getting some traction, and USCG and Voltage are not at all happy about it.

Apparently, the first threatened Syfert and have now filed a motion asking for sanctions against him. Yes, they want him fined for daring to help people respond to their scorched earth legal (business model) strategy.

What's funny is that Voltage, USCG and Dunlap Grubb & Weaver, may not be thrilled when they realize that some of the language used in their request for sanctions could be turned around and used against them as well:

"Any attorney ... who so multiplies the proceedings in any case unreasonably and vexatiously may be required by the court to satisfy personally the excess costs, expenses, and attorneys' fees reasonably incurred because of such conduct."

That sorta sounds like what USCG/DGW is doing, doesn't it?

Beyond sanctions, the motion says that Syfert should have to pay them for having to deal with people making filings in their own defense. Are they serious?

Syfert has a wonderful reply to the motion, noting that the jurisdiction is wrong, that since he's not a party to the lawsuit he is not subject to sanctions and that offering up legal forms does not make one liable for how they are used (and if it did, all sorts of legal forms publishers would be in trouble). There's also an amusing bit, where DGW includes an angry email from Syfert in response to a phone call between Syfert and Weaver (the W in DGW), where Syfert, in a mocking tone, suggests DGW hire him. DGW uses this to suggest that Syfert has ulterior motives. However, in his reply, Syfert points out that DGW left out the email where Weaver told Syfert they were actually looking to hire lawyers and asked for his resume... Both the motion for sanctions and the reply are after the jump...

Filed Under: copyright, diy forms, education, graham syfert, hurt locker, sanctions
Companies: dunlap grubb & weaver, us copyright group

What If We Gave Toddlers An 'F' In Walking?

from the rethinking-education dept

theodp writes "To improve math and science education, Physics prof Dr. Yung Tae Kim thinks professors and teachers should take a page from skateboarding. 'The persistence and the dedication needed in skateboarding — that's what we need to be teaching,' explains Kim. 'No one says to a toddler, 'You have ten weeks to walk, and if you can't, you get an F and you're not allowed to try to walk anymore.' It's absurd, right? But the same thing is true with math and science education. If you want to learn trig or calculus, it's set at such a pace in schools that it guarantees that only the absolutely best students will learn it.' Kim says it's possible to 'polish the turd' of high school and college education, and lays out his plan for doing so in Building A New Culture Of Teaching And Learning (YouTube: parts 1-2-3), a video drawn from a farewell talk he gave to his Northwestern students. There's more on The Way of Dr. Tae at DrTae.org and PhysicsOfSkateboarding.com."

Filed Under: education, learning, teaching

Colleges Experimenting With Bulk-Buying E-Textbooks... And Forcing Students To Pay Up

from the bye-bye-used-book-market dept

We've pointed out in the past how the college textbook market is ripe for disruption. You have a market where books are ridiculously overpriced by publishers, knowing that students are often compelled to purchase the product. As book prices have continued to rise, apparently some universities are experimenting with bulk buying licenses to ebook textbooks and simply charging the students a fee. The schools all say they're doing this to reduce textbook fees -- and I'm sure they mean well. But the very fact that many publishers seem to be jumping on this as well suggests that they know damn well, in the end, this will work out well for them. First, it forces all the students to "buy" the books at full price. It wipes out the secondary market (which many students make use of in selling their books back), and even the case of the student who just checks the book out of the library. Also, we've seen in places like Canada how a simple mandatory student fee can start out low, and then suddenly jump massively. It's good that some universities want to lower book fees, and making use of ebooks is a possible solution, but mandatory fees seem ripe for abuse.

Filed Under: ebooks, education, textbooks, universities

Virginia High School Says Barring Students From Doing Outside Research Helps Them 'Think For Themselves'

from the this-is-education? dept

A few folks have sent over this bizarre and slightly scary story of the the Westfield High School in Fairfax Virginia, which recently sent home a notice of "Expectations of Integrity" for the school's Advanced Placement (AP) World History class, which admonished students not to do any outside research at all:

"You are only allowed to use your OWN knowledge, your OWN class notes, class handouts, your OWN class homework, or The Earth and Its Peoples textbook to complete assignments and assessments UNLESS specifically informed otherwise by your instructor.''

Internet? No, not allowed. Other books? Nope. Talking to anyone? No. Not other students, friends, family, experts or even strangers. The teacher made this clear:

"You may not discuss/mention/chat/hand signal/smoke signal/Facebook/IM/text/email to a complete stranger ANY answers/ideas/questions/thoughts/opinions/hints/instructions."

The school has suggested that the letter was "a little tongue-in-cheek," though that doesn't really make sense. Yes, I'm sure the bit about the smoke signals, etc. was "tongue in cheek," but it sounds like the general sentiment remains. But, the thing is, the school's defense of the policy doesn't make much sense either:

"The idea was to think for yourself," he said, "rather than to pick up something from somewhere else and parrot it back."

Huh? If you want people to "think for themselves" and not "parrot back" what they picked up from somewhere else, I can't think of any better way than encouraging students to find multiple sources and multiple viewpoints (including differing viewpoints) so that they learn to think through things from multiple perspectives, which really pushes people to "think for themselves" by weighing the different bits of information to decide what's credible and what's not. By requiring just a single resource, none of that happens.

Filed Under: education, outside sources, thinking, virginia

Can Handing Out 'Txting Kills' Thumb Bands Stop People From Texting While Driving?

from the beats-bad-laws dept

We've pointed out that some recent studies have suggested that laws that ban texting-while-driving may have actually made the roads more dangerous, because it hasn't stopped people from texting, but just caused them to further hide the activity by holding the phone down low -- forcing them to take their eyes off the road more. This isn't to say that we think texting while driving is a good idea -- it's not. But just because you pass a law trying to ban a really dumb idea, it doesn't mean it will have the desired effect, and the early evidence suggests that there are serious unintended consequences with these laws.

Instead of laws, I think that a combination of education and technology could be a lot more effective, and it appears that at least some law enforcement folks are trying to increase the educational aspect. Parker Mason points us to the news that police in Iowa have started issuing "Txting Kills" thumb bands (sort of like the Livestrong bracelets... but for your thumb) rather than tickets to those caught texting while driving (they're also just handing them out at schools). It's nice to see an educational component, rather than just strict punishment, but I'm not convinced that thumb bands alone will do the trick...

Filed Under: driving, education, iowa, texting

Who Owns Your Class Notes? Cal State Threatens Students Who Sell Their Notes

from the who-owns-your-mind dept

SongLifter points us to the news that the California State University system has sent a cease-and-desist letter to the site NoteUtopia, for enabling students to buy and sell various class notes (among other things). On top of that, it has sent emails to students at its universities, warning them that using a site like NoteUtopia can result in discipline -- including expulsion. There is, in fact, a provision California State education code that prohibits preparing, selling, transferring, distributing or publishing notes or recordings of lectures for "any commercial purpose."

Now, I'm sure some will defend this as either (1) a way to stop cheating or (2) because of the supposed, if ambiguously explained "evils" of "commercial use," but it does seem a bit troubling to threaten the website itself for this, or to tell students that they cannot sell their own notes. The threat of "cheating," via others' notes has always seemed overblown to me. You still need to actually learn the material to pass the class, and if you can learn it better via the notes of others, more power to you. I would guess that it's actually harder to do things that way since the very act of note taking is what helps many people learn in the first place. As for the commercial use issue, again, I'm sort of at a loss for why this matters? If there really is a market for notes, then what, exactly, is the problem?

In the end, I'm just left scratching my head in wondering why the university system should care about this at all, when in most cases, all this will do is provide another source of information for students who wish to learn something.

Filed Under: cal state, california, class notes, commercial use, education
Companies: noteutopia

What's Wrong With Students Reusing Papers?

from the double-standards dept

Copycense points us to a story by English professor, James Lang, who notes that many universities and professors say that it's unethical or against school rules for students to reuse papers for multiple courses, but the more he thinks about it, the more he wonders why this is wrong, noting that professors do this all the time, reusing papers, presentations, research and lesson plans. Even if the idea is that students are supposed to "do work," it's not clear that there's anything wrong with a student reusing a paper, as long as it suffices for the assignment:

But--practically speaking--the opportunity to reuse a paper might arise only once or twice in a student's career, thanks to the diversity of our course assignments and disciplines. A paper assignment that a student gets in my English class on 20th-century literature won't be anything like her assignment in Renaissance literature--much less from psychology or sociology. Because the content of courses differs so much, the opportunity to use the same paper will happen only rarely.

But when it does, why not allow a student to take advantage of the opportunity? Suppose a student writes a final research paper for an introductory psychology course in the fall semester of her freshman year, and receives helpful suggestions on it from the professor. That same student then takes an English-composition course with me in the spring, and I assign an open-topic research paper to finish the semester.

Why should I not encourage the student to revise her psychology paper, according to both the guidance she received from her previous professor and the new writing principles she has learned in my course? She couldn't merely turn in her old paper; it would have to fulfill the requirements of my assignment. The student would not only get the opportunity to return to a set of ideas she thought she had finished, but the assignment would also reinforce the interdisciplinary nature of knowledge and the curriculum.

The article is based around the question of whether it's okay to "plagiarize yourself," but I worry that even that's a bit misleading. You can't plagiarize yourself. Plagiarism is about passing off someone else's work as your own. Reusing work is not the same thing at all, but is a separate issue -- and one that doesn't really seem to be much of a problem once you think about it.

Filed Under: education, plagiarism, reuse