Is Algebra Necessary?
John Marzan ·
July 30, 2012 at 3:20pm
A TYPICAL American school day finds some six million high school students and two million college freshmen struggling with algebra. In both high school and college, all too many students are expected to fail. Why do we subject American students to this ordeal? I’ve found myself moving toward the strong view that we shouldn’t.
Read the whole thing. Algebra is hard for many American students, so make it non-mandatory to learn? What about Geometry? Physics?
UPDATE: If you're a parent, would you agree to this? A good idea?
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Comments:
Feb '12
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Algebra is necessary because it is one of the few subjects left that requires logical thinking and problem solving.
Maybe instead of saying, "Students are failing; why are we teaching them something so hard?" we should be thinking, "Students are failing; why are we teaching them so poorly?"
Jan '11
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Knowledge of algebra will make it difficult, but not impossible, to complain about the injustice of your company switching the retirement plan from a defined benefit to a defined contribution.
Mar '11
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Algebra is not necessary for a high school diploma, at least not a whole course. If you can teach a few important principles of Algebra in a general math course, that would be sufficient because, lets be honest, thats all that most graduates are ever going to use or understand anyway. Math is different from any other subject. And the more advanced math subjects are not for everyone. No amount of cramming kids into an algebra class is going to make them actually understand and appreciate algebra. You can get history and lit and social studies if you have basic reading comprehension skills. You don't automatically get algebra and higher maths if you have even solid basic math skills. Frankly, I think we'd be much better off requiring a course in basic finance at the high school level instead of algebra. And this is coming from a guy who truly appreciates the value of math in and of itself as a way of expanding the intellect, like philosophy or theology. But it's not for everyone, at least beyond what you can do on a cheap calculator. Better that kids understand interest rates and statistics than quadratic equations.
Edited on July 30, 2012 at 5:47amJul '11
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
When can we admit that school is no longer about teaching children and is more about babysitting children, employing union members, progressive brainwashing and legalized graft?
May '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Is any subject necessary? Why not just close the schools and have all the kids go apprentice somewhere? That way we can make sure they never have to learn anything that is not absolutely necessary for their profession. We will have a greater abundance of self esteem than we could ever wish for.
Feb '12
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Douglas,
I understand what you're saying, but I think algebra has a value above and beyond just the ability to repeat the quadratic formula.
Proper algebra instruction teaches systematic problem solving. The application of a few simple rules -- one can always add or subtract 0, multiply or divide by 1, order of operations -- can take all kinds of mathematical expression and turn them into something valuable.
Now, I'll be the first to acknowledge that students aren't taught to treat the rules of algebra as tools to solve problems, nor are they taught any kind of formal logic that might make algebraic problem solving less of a foreign language. But to abandon algebra is to abandon the one subject wherein logic is still required and can't be written out of the curriculum.
Nov '11
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
I am math challenged but I still think at least a few courses in Algebra (and especially geometry) are a good thing. I have had to pull out my old math book over the many years since and figure something out. However my big (huge) mistake was taking the 3 quarter math course for my college major instead of the computer course. They were at the end of cards then (isn't that funny?), but how much more useful this knowledge would have been on many different levels, and what the heck is calculus anyway. I'm actually still a little angry they didn't tell me this and steer me in that direction. If your kids aren't getting an education in computers (use and how they work) you should try to remedy the situation.
Sep '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Dropping algebra is a step in the wrong direction. Too many Americans are innumerate as it is. The need for the kind of skills required to master algebra, a relatively low-level mathematical skill, are just the kinds that are needed for an increasing proportion of jobs, not to mention life itself.
Years ago, Fran Lebowitz could quip, "In real life, I assure you, there is no such thing as algebra." Today, that sounds absurd. Get math or get left behind. It's that simple.
This complaint reminds me of the following (non-CoC compliant) web page. Don't click on it if you are averse to strong language. Here's an excerpt to give you the flavor:
Oct '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
douglas, algebra isn't THAT hard. it's part of basic math and helps you with logical thinking.
Sep '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
1. Don't confuse mathematics with 'what you can do on a cheap calculator.' Memorizing and regurgitating addition and multiplication tables is not mathematics.
2. You can't learn statistics without algebra. In fact, you can't learn almost any mathematics without a solid mastery of algebra. Many students who struggle in other math classes (like stats) have trouble precisely because they didn't learn algebra.
Oct '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
I think the author of the NYT piece should watch the movie Stand and Deliver. In that film, the H.S. students there tackled Calculus.
Oct '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
I think the real goal here is to level the playing field and narrow the achievement gap by removing math.
Sep '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
This is a plausible hypothesis. Sadly, efforts to reduce the gap have been unsuccessful so far. I guess if you can't do it legitimately, other ideas will occur to you.
The Left has tried to explain away the gap in a number of disingenuous and unhelpful ways in the past, blaming everyone except the most likely culprits. This only prolongs the agony and condemns victims of a poor educational system to flipping burgers or unemployment.
The first step in solving a problem is acknowledging it. Eliminating algebra from the curriculum does the opposite. Instead of acknowledging the problem of bad schools, it blames algebra for being too hard. NYT, hop on the clue train. It's pulling out of the station.
Mar '11
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Could ALL kids tackle Calculus that way? People come away with all the wrong lessons from these kinds of movies. They play into the notion that in every child, there's a calculus whiz or concert pianist or physicist just waiting to blossom. We walk out of the theater believing that if we just got the right teachers, if we changed the way we taught kids, if we just gave schools more money, then every child would be a prodigy of some kind. And that simply isn't true. Prodigies are so special because there are so few of them. Most kids, with solid work will at best be competent, and that's it. And that's the nature of the world, the way of things. We can no more change that than we can make the sun rise in the West. There are natural levels of abilities in human beings, and nothing we do is going to make most kids understand advanced math better. Its pearls before swine here.
May '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
But Douglas, I don't think anyone is talking about turning every child into a prodigy. We just want every child to have basic competency in simple algebra. In algebra, you learn how to read a graph. You learn orders of magnitude, and the difference between arithmetic and geometric (exponential) growth and decay. You learn how to distinguish known and unknown quantities, and that there are sometimes dependencies between knowns and unknowns that allow you, through the proper manipulation, to figure out the unknowns. You learn to recognize patterns and fill in the missing values or extrapolate.
These are basic skills for any responsible citizen in a democracy. They give the citizen the ability to question their elders and the "experts". When the average citizen can't tell the difference between simple mathematics and magic, we'll be in serious trouble.
Edited on July 30, 2012 at 8:15amSep '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Douglas
Could ALL kids tackle Calculus that way? People come away with all the wrong lessons from these kinds of movies. They play into the notion that in every child, there's a calculus whiz or concert pianist or physicist just waiting to blossom.
...
Have you seen this film? It is fairly closely based on historical events. The kids in the story were ordinary kids, but with some disadvantages. And yet they managed to learn calculus. The key difference was the teacher. And by the way, learning calculus does not equate to being a concert pianist. There are a lot more successful high school calculus students (a few hundred thousand per year) than there are concert pianists (a handful). That's 14% of graduating seniors.
Can any kid learn calculus? Maybe, maybe not. But we're talking algebra here, not calculus. The subtext of the NYT piece is, most kids are too dumb to learn math. If so, we're in trouble. I think educating them is worth a try.
Oct '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Douglas
Could ALL kids tackle Calculus that way? People come away with all the wrong lessons from these kinds of movies. They play into the notion that in every child, there's a calculus whiz or concert pianist or physicist just waiting to blossom. We walk out of the theater believing that if we just got the right teachers, if we changed the way we taught kids, if we just gave schools more money, then every child would be a prodigy of some kind. And that simply isn't true. Prodigies are so special because there are so few of them
The students taught by Edward James Olmos's character (Jaime Escalante) weren't "prodigies" but ordinary students who were either failing or had the potential to dropout of high school.
Oct '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
so the best way for american kids to become competitive with others around the world is to remove algebra, and maybe geometry and trigonometry too?
Sep '10
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
Let's just turn over the key's to 21st century leadership to the Chinese now and be done with it.
Dec '11
Re: Is Algebra Necessary?
I teach HS chemistry. Our students have abyssmal math scores. I have students enter my class who cannot divide by 1 without a calculator, or manipulate simple equations (like the density formula D = M/V). Students are so reliant upon calculators and computers that they lack the basic math knowlege to recognize even glaring errors. Even using calculators and computers, you have to know some basic math facts to know if the electronic answer makes some sense.
Part of the problem is letting all students use calculators for elementary math. Another (related) issue is that for a long time we moved away from memorization of basic math tables under the delusion that students would be able to do critical thinking without being able to recall basic facts.
At third problem is our culture tolerates innumeracy. No one admits being illiterate without some shame, but I have seen teachers tell students - with a smile- that they can't do math.
Lastly, while true you don't NEED "advanced" math to make it in the real world (I haven't since college), the more math you learn the better you get at the basic stuff you DO need.
Math works. Learn it.