Why teach algebra?

[StlouisramsX]

Having trouble keeping up.....2+2 still equals 4 right?

You just did algebra without even knowing it.

1 post X 1 duplicate post = 1 post².

[zn]

Having trouble keeping up.....2+2 still equals 4 right?

You just did algebra without even knowing it.

1 post X 1 duplicate post = 1 post².

Naw.

1 + it's duplicate = 1?

That's quantum physics.

[StlouisramsX]

Having trouble keeping up.....2+2 still equals 4 right?

You just did algebra without even knowing it.

1 post X 1 duplicate post = 1 post².

Naw.

1 + it's duplicate = 1?

That's quantum physics.

I still prefer English, and I think THAT is the most neglected of all subjects in the curriculum to date.

[nittany ram]

Here's a response to wv's article from a rather famous biology professor. FWIW...
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A modest proposal

July 29, 2012 at 7:08 pm PZ Myers


A typical American school day finds some six million high school students and two million college freshmen struggling with reading and writing. We ought to face reality: most of these students might graduate, but they’ll never crack another book in their life, the bulk of their written communications skills require nothing more than their thumbs and a tiny screen and fleeting comments that require neither punctuation nor even lower case — Y U NO WRT ME? — let alone grammar. If they make it to their version of advanced studies — business school — the epitome of literacy will be the 5 line, six words per line bullet point slide in PowerPoint, and most of the lines will consist of stock phrases.

Meanwhile, the schools invest time, money, and teachers in futile efforts to make students with the attention spans of mosquitos try to read short stories, and even novels…and then, in the inevitable standardized test, they are challenged to extract meaning from at best three paragraph snippets. They then regurgitate trivialities in the stock 5-paragraph essay: I’m going to tell you 3 things, here’s thing 1, here’s thing 2, here’s thing 3, I just told you 3 things.

Why are we wasting time on these antique skills? You know they hate reading, they don’t want to read, and once we stop nagging them about reading, they’ll avoid it altogether for the rest of their lives. Why read a book when you can just wait for the Hollywood version, which will also include breasts and explosions? These are also skills most people won’t need in whatever jobs they end up doing.

So here’s my proposal: let’s stop.

We’ll save money. School can be abbreviated, getting the kids into the workforce faster. We won’t need to train teachers; any babysitter will do. And most importantly, graduation rates will soar right through the roof. And as we all know, graduation rates are the only numbers we need to determine whether our students is learning, and our schools is teaching.

I’m certain this idea will have enthusiastic Republican support, and that the Democrats will follow along.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I know, you don’t believe I’m serious. Then how can we believe Andrew Hacker? He seriously proposes in the NY Times (which will apparently publish anything nowadays) that we should stop teaching algebra. Algebra! The one basic, elementary mathematical principle we should expect our kids to learn, and he considers it superfluous.

His reasoning is bizarre.


The toll mathematics takes begins early. To our nation’s shame, one in four ninth graders fail to finish high school. In South Carolina, 34 percent fell away in 2008-9, according to national data released last year; for Nevada, it was 45 percent. Most of the educators I’ve talked with cite algebra as the major academic reason.

Shirley Bagwell, a longtime Tennessee teacher, warns that “to expect all students to master algebra will cause more students to drop out.” For those who stay in school, there are often “exit exams,” almost all of which contain an algebra component. In Oklahoma, 33 percent failed to pass last year, as did 35 percent in West Virginia.

Um, yeah? Math is non-trivial, and it’s conceptually difficult for some students to master. But that is true of every single thing worth learning. The purpose of an education is not to get a diploma, but to learn challenging and useful knowledge, and his approach is to redefine education to be something anyone can get with little effort — in essence, he’s making an education achievable by more people by stripping out the difficult learning part. But that’s not an education any more!

And to remove algebra from the curriculum…I can scarcely believe it. We live in a technological society. Not learning algebra in the public school system means those kids will not be prepared, will not be qualified, to do anything in science and engineering. I’m serious: if you don’t know algebra, you can’t do basic quantitative chemistry, and if you can’t do that, you can’t do biology. At all. Not the molecular/biochemical/bench side, not the ecological/evolutionary/field side. You can’t do physics, that’s for sure. Forget math and statistics. If you’re not capable of grasping statistics, forget psychology, too.

You can probably still be a competent English major, I admit. But wouldn’t we be better off if all the English majors had an inkling of the foundations of science, as well as all the science majors having a touch of the humanities and social sciences? Shouldn’t we expect that even those people who choose not to pursue a college degree ought to have a bare minimum of competence in math and history and language and science and art, if we’re actually going to deem them educated?

Setting algebra as a minimum is actually setting a low bar. If a third of the students are failing that minimal expectation, then the solution isn’t to simply disappear the requirement, but to teach it better. Or admit that students who can’t read, who can’t write, who can’t do a simple algebraic manipulation, are not educated. Period. No excuses.

And if you’re going to do that, you might as well write off any delusions about having a well-informed citizenry.

[wv ram]

Here's a response to wv's article from a rather famous biology professor. FWIW...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A modest proposal

July 29, 2012 at 7:08 pm PZ Myers


...The purpose of an education is not to get a diploma, but to learn challenging and useful knowledge, and his approach is to redefine education to be something anyone can get with little effort — in essence, he’s making an education achievable by more people by stripping out the difficult learning part. But that’s not an education any more!
...And if you’re going to do that, you might as well write off any delusions about having a well-informed citizenry.

Well, except he hasnt proved algebra is 'useful' just by saying its useful. Its not useful to me. Like, at all. I think its fair to say, it was a waste of my time to learn it in high-school. Its a form of 'specialized knowledge'. Its not like 'English skills' which are not what i would call 'specialized knowledge'. I can think of fifteen thousand other forms of 'specialized knowledge' that are equivalent with Algebra. So, why algebra? Who decided Algebra would be taught this way? Who? And why? I'd like to know that.

Someone explain to me why Algebra is more relevant and more important to teach than...say..oh...Farming 101 ?

w
v

[zn]

My 2 cents.

There's no such thing as "education."

There are only and have always only been VISIONS of education.

Most people in this thread are on the side of claiming that education should be measure by practical value.

Okay that's one vision.

What they're doing however is translating the other vision into their vision and then judging it accordingly. So, if you think education is supposed to have practical value, you then demand that the algebra advocates demonstrate its usefulness.

Except for the most part algebra advocates don't have a vision that relates directly to issues of practical value.

That doesn't mean they fail to be practical, it means their entire way of seeing this is different.

From my experience, the algebra advocates have an ideal of the well-rounded, educated person. They could positively give a crap if it has "practical value." The point is to form the well-rounded person, and that's an ideal in its own right. It seems to me that the value of the "well-rounded student" is that it gives people options.

So when people say "be practical," to me they're just saying "be me. Have MY vision."

Notice how other education systems handle this.

Europe famously tracks students into practical education AND into a separate slot for more deliberately scholastic education.

However what's the flaw there. Well, easy: it's a class system. Pure and simple and there's no getting around that. You--you;re born to be a mechanic. You--you get to go on to get an advanced degree and be an engineer. A pure class system.

The USA doesn't do that or rather does it to a far lesser extent.

And frankly, if you're going to have a view that education promotes the well-rounded educated citizen, then why not make it open to all. Give people options. So for every individual like me who struggled with algebra (and that's with 2 scientists as parents), there is some kid from a less fortunate background who finds greater opportunities because they didn't get vocation tracked and go on to defy their social slotting.

And btw I would be very suspicious of anyone claiming that drop-out rates and generally or even primarily due to one class. If people are going to drop out, it's not because of ONE requirement. It's because of a long list of other things. I doubt anyone could prove to me that algebra directly fuels drop-out rates.

Now where do I personally stand?

I am not going to say.

I just want to stress that there's no such thing as "education"--there are always only nothing but VISIONS of education.

What I see in this thread is that people are just playing out those differences.

[Stan]

Having trouble keeping up.....2+2 still equals 4 right?

Stay tuned.

[Stan]

It does require introspection. You claimed if math was on the test you wouldn't be a lawyer. Therefore those applicants versed in math were prejudicially denied exercising their strength for the law school admission test. Please don't deflect the issue with other disciplines unless you can show where they dropped a cornerstone of education like math for their entrance test as law schools have with the LSAT.

You completely overlook the benefit of algebra towards developing abstract thought constructs as has been mentioned in this thread a few times already.

Now for the effect on your profession as you already know there are too many lawyers. A downright glut. No doubt in part the effect of discriminating against those with strengths in math (and science) lead to law school enrollments of overwhelmingly liberal arts majors with law schools expanding enrollments to meet the increased demand. Increased demand since the liberal arts offer little employment opportunity outside of teaching or graduate studies of which law schools were more than willing to oblige.

Well Stan you've made a bunch of opinion-statements but you havent backed any of it up with facts.
Saying there are 'too many lawyers' is an opinion. Its not a fact. YOU (and some others, of course) think there are too many. How can you prove that there are 'too many lawyers' ? Are there too many assistant prosecutors? Try telling 'them' that.
Face it, its just your opinion. Another opinion is that there are not nearly 'enough' lawyers. Its just opin-yuns.

Personally i have issues -- LOTS of issues -- with the 'laws' -- not the 'lawyers', really. The lawyers are just an integrated part of the whole system, like engineers and the Pentagon/military and the police and the government officials and the media and all the rest. The lawyers fit into the system the same way the rest of the 'cogs' in the 'machine' fit. There's much to say about all that but it gets into politics, and i'm trying to walk a fine line here. This whole thread is right on the line between politics and general culture/society/education stuff. I dont want to cross the line too far on this board.

Now you said by eliminating math on the LSAT the math wizzes "were prejudicially denied exercising their strength for the law school admission test". Interesting idea. Its one i hadnt thought of. But then, if you include math you are prejudicing those who are not math wizzes but are poetry-wizzes or art-wizzes or some other kind of wizzes. And no matter what specialized-knowledge you put in or leave out, some group is going to be helped and some group is going to be harmed. So for me the question, maybe, is -- IS math a core-requirement for being a lawyer? Is it essential. Like English. Well, i dunno. Like i said, its not essential in my line of work at all. In other kinds of law, i'm sure it is essenital. So maybe the whole system needs changed. Maybe to practice criminal law one should take one kind of test and to practice other kinds of law one should take other kinds of tests. Or maybe -- and this is just my opinion -- the whole entire "LSAT" system is a crock of shit. I mean, West Virginia only instituted the LSAT in the early 90s. Before that, three years of law school was deemed enough. I could go on about the moneymaking-racket known as the LSAT but its really off-point.

Maybe i 'overlook the benefits of algebra' as you say. Maybe. But again, algebra to me is just one of a gazillion forms of 'specialized knowledge'. I think you are overlooking the gazillion other forms of specialized knowledge. I mean why algebra instead of the others? What 'assumptions' are there behind the push for algebra?

By assumption i mean this really -- I think if one really likes the whole "Mega-Technological-Corporate-system" we are living in, then one will want the students shaped and fitted and molded so they can slide right into 'that' system. Especially if one thinks 'school' is all about 'getting a job' as you and waterfield seem to think. But there are other views of what education should be about. And other views about what the 'best society' would look like.

I think algebra is a wonderful body of 'specialized knowledge'. One among a gazillion. I dont think it should be required of any student unless they are going into science or math fields though. Thats what i think.

Ok, this is way too long and rambly now. I got nuthin else to add.

w
v

FYI there is a glut of lawyers. You can look it up. Has been getting worse for a decade. Doesn't matter which law school you graduate from either. Much more difficult to get employment and the wage scale is falling. Law school employment data is misleading since any employment of graduates is included in the data. So the law school graduate waiter or car attendant is considered employed which is misleading. Search term glut of lawyers yields:


http://www.businessweek.com/articles/20 ... aw-schools (glut-leads-lawyers-to-surprise-sue-law-schools)

http://www.economicmodeling.com/2011/06 ... -3-states/ (new-lawyers-glutting-the-market-in-all-but-3-states)

http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/arti ... pay_bills/ (the_law_school_bubble_how_long_will_it_last_if_law_grads_cant_pay_bills)

Too many lawyers and too little opportunity yields fewer jobs and falling wages. Supply and demand. Econ 101. (Careful now algebra required.)

I must disagree about putting lawyers in the same class as engineers. Engineering is governed by immutable fact. A finite product produced. Lawyers, government officials and to a lesser extent the police are at the whim of the lawmakers and ultimately the upholding of the laws. Yet laws can change overnight. Worse yet the law is not enforced equally. The very foundation of the law can be changed on a whim.

I appreciate your willingness to consider the effects of eliminating the math section of the LSAT upon the individual so inclined and the profession as a whole. I believe it has had a more profound effect than you admit. Not only in the number of lawyers but the quality. No way can I quantify it and assuredly it's not something law schools will investigate either, yet. LSAT stands for the Law School Admission Test. It is taken before law school and is used like the SAT by the law schools in their admissions process. I think you're confusing the State Bar Exam with the LSAT or perhaps there's another test besides the Bar Exam post law school? If there is I've not heard of it but I'm not a lawyer and not in WV.

I also seem to have to keep pointing this out but algebra is not merely specialised knowledge. It is the exercising of the brain to deal with abstract concepts. You simply do not get it. That's fine. But do not overlook what is really involved. Algebra is a gateway class to higher mathematics and all the hard sciences. It is essential for our modern quality of life and most solutions needed for the advancement of our society both technologically and increasingly the social welfare thereof.

I agree the course in algebra should be an elective however the exposure to basic algebra for all kids should be done.

[Rookie]

Do I Goose Step or buy more Ammo? I'll play it safe and get more ammo. You can never have to much ammo..
"wv ram
1st Round Draft Pick
1.Obedient soldiers to the army;
2.Obedient workers to the mines;
3.Well subordinated civil servants to government;
4.Well subordinated clerks to industry
5.Citizens who thought alike about major issues. " John Taylor Gatto"

[zn]

Do I Goose Step or buy more Ammo? I'll play it safe and get more ammo. You can never have to much ammo..
"wv ram
1st Round Draft Pick
1.Obedient soldiers to the army;
2.Obedient workers to the mines;
3.Well subordinated civil servants to government;
4.Well subordinated clerks to industry
5.Citizens who thought alike about major issues. " John Taylor Gatto"

Rookie...no disrespect, but, what does that post even mean?

What does the the list of obedient guys have to do with wv?

And what does that have to do with ammo?

Notice no one on the board deliberately tries to be cryptic? Just speak your mind directly and openly so we can follow you.

[wv ram]

I just want to stress that there's no such thing as "education"--there are always only nothing but VISIONS of education.
What I see in this thread is that people are just playing out those differences.

I agree totally with that.

I disagree with anyone saying Algebra leads to being 'well-rounded' though. Why is someone who can
do Algebra 'well-rounded' ? Its just one body of specialized knowledge among a gazillion other bodies
of specialized knowledge.

And It may be that there is too much knowledge now for anyone to even 'be' 'well-rounded' anymore. I dunno.

At any rate, Visions -- yes. The thing is, i like it when people 'know' they are just talking about their 'vision' and not something 'normal' or 'the truth' or 'the last word'. Its similar to knowing what an 'opinion' is on the football board.

I also dont think there has ever been some 'golden age of education' that we have 'moved away from'.

w
v

[zn]

I just want to stress that there's no such thing as "education"--there are always only nothing but VISIONS of education.
What I see in this thread is that people are just playing out those differences.

I agree totally with that.

I disagree with anyone saying Algebra leads to being 'well-rounded' though. Why is someone who can
do Algebra 'well-rounded' ? Its just one body of specialized knowledge among a gazillion other bodies
of specialized knowledge.

And It may be that there is too much knowledge now for anyone to even 'be' 'well-rounded' anymore. I dunno.

At any rate, Visions -- yes. The thing is, i like it when people 'know' they are just talking about their 'vision' and not something 'normal' or 'the truth' or 'the last word'. Its similar to knowing what an 'opinion' is on the football board.

I also dont think there has ever been some 'golden age of education' that we have 'moved away from'.

w
v

Well the whole concept of the "well-rounded, educated individual" is a fraught one.

Certainly it doesn't have to be elitist if you think of it as introducing people to different options and possibilities.

But also the idea of the "educated person" has changed too, of course.

[Pancake06]

I won't argue algebra helps in developing certain parts of the brain but I doubt it's the only thing that does. I don't see why algebra has to be force fed to kids when there might be an alternative they would actually have an interest in.

I can read something 50 times and if i don't have the interest in the subject it just doesn't stick. On the other hand if it does interest me I'm like a sponge and it's easy to learn.

[zn]

I won't argue algebra helps in developing certain parts of the brain but I doubt it's the only thing that does. I don't see why algebra has to be force fed to kids when there might be an alternative they would actually have an interest in.

I can read something 50 times and if i don't have the interest in the subject it just doesn't stick. On the other hand if it does interest me I'm like a sponge and it's easy to learn.

Which begs the question--are we supposed to only educate kids in what interests them?

See the dilemma?

They have the rest of their time and the rest of their lives to do what interests them. The question then becomes, what do we mean when we say someone is "educated"?

[Pancake06]

I won't argue algebra helps in developing certain parts of the brain but I doubt it's the only thing that does. I don't see why algebra has to be force fed to kids when there might be an alternative they would actually have an interest in.

I can read something 50 times and if i don't have the interest in the subject it just doesn't stick. On the other hand if it does interest me I'm like a sponge and it's easy to learn.

Which begs the question--are we supposed to only educate kids in what interests them?

See the dilemma?

They have the rest of their time and the rest of their lives to do what interests them. The question then becomes, what do we mean when we say someone is "educated"?

They also have the rest of there lives to go learn algebra if they want but yes I see the dilemma.