Ethnomath

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ExpertNovice

Senior member
Mar 4, 2005
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What do you know about ethnomath?

Secondary Math: an Integrated Approach: Focus on Algebra, but Jennings calls it Rain Forest Algebra.
It includes Maya Angelou's poetry, pictures of President Clinton and Mali wood carvings, lectures on what environmental sinners we all are and photos of students with names such as Tatuk and Esteban who offer my daughter thoughts on life. It also contains praise for the wife of Pythagoras, father of the Pythagorean theorem, and asks students such mathematical brain teasers as What role should zoos play in our society? However, equations don't show up until Page 165, and the first solution of a linear equation, which comes on Page 218, is reached by guessing and checking.
Jennings points out that Focus on Algebra is 812 pages long, compared with 200 for the average math textbook in Japan.

(812 pages?. I took over 300 pages of notes in my Algebra classes, but we had no textbook.)

http://www.wpri.org/WIInterest/Vol10No1/Vukmir10.1.pdf

http://www.dm.unipi.it/~jama/ethno/

http://www.cs.uidaho.edu/~casey931/seminar/ethno.html





(The Geometry version is 846 pages.)
 
jman19

jman19

Lifer
Nov 3, 2000
11,225
664
126
Originally posted by: ExpertNovice
What do you know about ethnomath?

Secondary Math: an Integrated Approach: Focus on Algebra, but Jennings calls it Rain Forest Algebra.
It includes Maya Angelou's poetry, pictures of President Clinton and Mali wood carvings, lectures on what environmental sinners we all are and photos of students with names such as Tatuk and Esteban who offer my daughter thoughts on life. It also contains praise for the wife of Pythagoras, father of the Pythagorean theorem, and asks students such mathematical brain teasers as What role should zoos play in our society? However, equations don't show up until Page 165, and the first solution of a linear equation, which comes on Page 218, is reached by guessing and checking.
Jennings points out that Focus on Algebra is 812 pages long, compared with 200 for the average math textbook in Japan.

(812 pages?. I took over 300 pages of notes in my Algebra classes, but we had no textbook.)

http://www.wpri.org/WIInterest/Vol10No1/Vukmir10.1.pdf

http://www.dm.unipi.it/~jama/ethno/

http://www.cs.uidaho.edu/~casey931/seminar/ethno.html





(The Geometry version is 846 pages.)
Click to expand...

We can't even teach the basics of mathematics in this country properly, why bother with this?
 
Safeway

Safeway

Lifer
Jun 22, 2004
12,075
11
81
Yea, since they can't even teach people how to add anymore, what is this going to accomplish?
 
J

Jmman

Diamond Member
Dec 17, 1999
5,302
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I heard about a class at a prestigious university that instructs "teachers" how to teach mathematics with social consciousness or some other liberal BS. They would teach them how to do mathematics problems by calculating how many AIDS cases there are in Africa, how many seals got clubbed, and other nonsense. I wish I had a link, it was so far out there.....
 
P

PELarson

Platinum Member
Mar 27, 2001
2,289
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Originally posted by: Safeway
Yea, since they can't even teach people how to add anymore, what is this going to accomplish?
Click to expand...

Possibly by showing how math relates toi the real world!
 
C

cquark

Golden Member
Apr 4, 2004
1,741
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If ethnomathematics is a subfield of the social sciences, it's a good idea, but the title "secondary math: an integrated approach" makes me think that book is intended for secondary school math teachers and students, in which case it's completely irrelevant and almost certainly quite harmful.

Too many math teachers are incompetent at basics like fractions, much less anything higher, as you can read on the Learning Curves blog, where you find entries like this one at
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/05/end-of-age-of-ignorance.html
(One more story? Oh, you're twisting my arm. On the final exam in the class for the pre-service teachers, one student called me over to answer a question. On the screen of her calculator it read:

.666666666667
Ans>Frac
2/3

The student points to the fraction 2/3 and asks me, "Is that the same as 3/4?")
Click to expand...
Here's another example, where the education majors can't find the area of a triangle:
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/04/triangles.html
The scary part is that these aren't atypical results for education majors in university math classes. It's a vicious cycle, because these are the people who are "teaching" math to the next generation of young students.
 
T

Tommunist

Golden Member
Dec 1, 2004
1,544
0
0
Originally posted by: cquark
If ethnomathematics is a subfield of the social sciences, it's a good idea, but the title "secondary math: an integrated approach" makes me think that book is intended for secondary school math teachers and students, in which case it's completely irrelevant and almost certainly quite harmful.

Too many math teachers are incompetent at basics like fractions, much less anything higher, as you can read on the Learning Curves blog, where you find entries like this one at
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/05/end-of-age-of-ignorance.html
(One more story? Oh, you're twisting my arm. On the final exam in the class for the pre-service teachers, one student called me over to answer a question. On the screen of her calculator it read:

.666666666667
Ans>Frac
2/3

The student points to the fraction 2/3 and asks me, "Is that the same as 3/4?")
Click to expand...
Here's another example, where the education majors can't find the area of a triangle:
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/04/triangles.html
The scary part is that these aren't atypical results for education majors in university math classes. It's a vicious cycle, because these are the people who are "teaching" math to the next generation of young students.
Click to expand...

most of my best math teachers are folks who retired from some other professional work and are teaching just to "give back" what they have learned out in the real world. this isn't to say that someone who stays in academia can't be a good math teacher - they certainly can. but the newer slews of teachers aren't like the old - i can say that much.
 
N

NeenerNeener

Senior member
Jun 8, 2005
414
0
0
Originally posted by: cquark
If ethnomathematics is a subfield of the social sciences, it's a good idea, but the title "secondary math: an integrated approach" makes me think that book is intended for secondary school math teachers and students, in which case it's completely irrelevant and almost certainly quite harmful.

Too many math teachers are incompetent at basics like fractions, much less anything higher, as you can read on the Learning Curves blog, where you find entries like this one at
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/05/end-of-age-of-ignorance.html
(One more story? Oh, you're twisting my arm. On the final exam in the class for the pre-service teachers, one student called me over to answer a question. On the screen of her calculator it read:

.666666666667
Ans>Frac
2/3

The student points to the fraction 2/3 and asks me, "Is that the same as 3/4?")
Click to expand...
Here's another example, where the education majors can't find the area of a triangle:
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/04/triangles.html
The scary part is that these aren't atypical results for education majors in university math classes. It's a vicious cycle, because these are the people who are "teaching" math to the next generation of young students.
Click to expand...

Oh man!!! I weep for the future. :(
 
shira

shira

Diamond Member
Jan 12, 2005
9,500
6
81
Originally posted by: ExpertNovice
What do you know about ethnomath?
Click to expand...

That's just the point, isn't it?

None of us here know ANYTHING about this subject, its thesis, or how it's applied. Given our complete ignorance, I find it interesting that people have such strong opinions.
 
E

ExpertNovice

Senior member
Mar 4, 2005
939
0
0
Originally posted by: shira
Originally posted by: ExpertNovice
What do you know about ethnomath?
Click to expand...

That's just the point, isn't it?

None of us here know ANYTHING about this subject, its thesis, or how it's applied. Given our complete ignorance, I find it interesting that people have such strong opinions.
Click to expand...

That is why I'm asking. It has been around since 1997, or earlier. I was hoping for direct knowlege. It would seem logical that those who have direct knowlege because they are teaching it would not say anything.

As for strong opinions? Why not. Basic research will allow conclusions about whether the idea is good or not. It does not tell us how wide spread it is.
 
E

ExpertNovice

Senior member
Mar 4, 2005
939
0
0
Here is what Senator Robert Byrd had to say.

Mr. President, over the past decade, I have been continually puzzled by our Nation's failure to produce better students despite public concern and despite the billions of Federal dollars which annually are appropriated for various programs intended to aid and improve education.

(snip)

Recently Marianne Jennings, a professor at Arizona State University, found that her teenage daughter could not solve a mathematical equation. This was all the more puzzling because her daughter was getting an A in algebra. Curious about the disparity, Jennings took a look at her daughter's algebra textbook, euphemistically titled, "Secondary Math: An Integrated Approach: Focus on Algebra." Here it is-quite a handsome cover on the book. After reviewing it, Jennings dubbed it "Rain Forest Algebra." I have recently obtained a copy of the same strange textbook--this is it, as I have already indicated--and I have to go a step further and call it whacko algebra.

This textbook, written by a conglomerate of authors, lists 5 so-called "algebra authors," but it boasts 20 "other series authors" and 4 "multicultural reviewers." We are talking about algebra now. Why we need multicultural review of an algebra textbook is a question which I would like to hear someone answer, and the fact that there are 4 times as many "other series authors" as "algebra authors" in this book made me suspect that this really was not an algebra textbook at all.


(snip)
Click to expand...


First, I just heard about this.

It probably is not true indicating that Senator Byrd is lying because I have never heard about this on the mainstream media. Nope, it was on the Sean Hannity show immediatly after turning off the NPR channel.

Of course, since it was Sean I did my own research, just like I would do with CNN, or the mainstream media.

I'm not shocked that the Senator doesn't understand the problems in the government run schools. He is not looking at who runs them for one thing.

My next thought is that Senator Byrds comments were from 1997. So it could be suggested that the information was old. However, the books are still being sold and I found one website that showed the book being voted in for use by a government run school. Text books do not sell well unless schools are purchasing them. For a textbook to still be in print after 8+ years the book is doing reasonably well.

Was this part of the "village raising the children" initiative? It would be about the right time. 1991/1992 plus a year to start implementing plus a year to right the text books and get them adopted by school districts.




http://www.michigan.gov/scope/0,1607,7-155-13515_13516_13518-36673--,00.html

http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs...le?AID=/20050524/NEWS01/505240358/1006

This one is from 1997....
http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:20...d+Approach:+Focus+on+Geometry%22&hl=en
 
E

ExpertNovice

Senior member
Mar 4, 2005
939
0
0
One additional thought.

Last century, ok ok.... in the late 1990's :) some of the school districts (New York for one) stopped giving the children homework or allowing them to take text books home.

My thought back then was pretty naive.
(1) It was on the mainstream media and given their accuracy it seemed plausible that the information was a partial or complete fabrication.
(2) Even if true, I tried to assume the best. The best being that the children would simply be uneducated. Since this has seemingly been a long standing goal of the NEA it was just another method to be used.

However, how widespread is the described trend?

I?m now wondering if the reason is so that the parents don?t even see what is being taught to their children because they are not seeing the books or the work.
 
I

irwincur

Golden Member
Jul 8, 2002
1,899
0
0
The liberal agenda has officially jumped the shark.

About time this idiocy ceased. About as stupid as the far right pushing for Creationism...
 
G

Gigantopithecus

Diamond Member
Dec 14, 2004
7,664
0
71
Originally posted by: cquark
If ethnomathematics is a subfield of the social sciences, it's a good idea, but the title "secondary math: an integrated approach" makes me think that book is intended for secondary school math teachers and students, in which case it's completely irrelevant and almost certainly quite harmful.

Too many math teachers are incompetent at basics like fractions, much less anything higher, as you can read on the Learning Curves blog, where you find entries like this one at
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/05/end-of-age-of-ignorance.html
(One more story? Oh, you're twisting my arm. On the final exam in the class for the pre-service teachers, one student called me over to answer a question. On the screen of her calculator it read:

.666666666667
Ans>Frac
2/3

The student points to the fraction 2/3 and asks me, "Is that the same as 3/4?")
Click to expand...
Here's another example, where the education majors can't find the area of a triangle:
http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/2005/04/triangles.html
The scary part is that these aren't atypical results for education majors in university math classes. It's a vicious cycle, because these are the people who are "teaching" math to the next generation of young students.
Click to expand...

This, not 'ethnomath' or some liberal agenda, is the primary reason why our students continue to perform worse and worse.
 
E

ExpertNovice

Senior member
Mar 4, 2005
939
0
0
Sad. I thought people cared about the children. What about the marching orders stated by the mainstream media? Shouldn't this generate some outrage from their audience?

Guess not.

Turn out the lights. Save the electricity since fewer and fewer can read anyway.
 
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