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Chronology of the NEA

I came across this web page recently while doing some research on John Dewey and John Goodlad. Both men are cut from the same progressive, humanist cloth, and this page tells the incredible tale of how various education and government organizations are intimately tied together.  If you do a search for John Goodlad’s name, you will discover that in 1968 he was involved in moving forward a plan for national curriculum centers. In the 1980’s, Mr. Goodlad would be hired by BYU to help them form the Public School Partnership that created the framework for the 5 surrounding school districts to be heavily influenced by the philosophies Goodlad and his cohorts espoused…one of which is constructivism.

http://www.crossroad.to/Excerpts/chronologies/nea.htm

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One Step Ahead of the Train Wreck

A great article from Barry Garelick on the insanity of Everyday math and the virtues of Singapore math.

http://ednews.org/articles/one-step-ahead-of-the-train-wreck.html

What exactly is the attraction of reform math? I still haven’t figured out why so many “educators” are so blind to this method of teaching and the results it’s producing.  Two year colleges are being hit especially hard with the number of students requiring remedial math. Utah is no exception, but here’s some hard figures from another community college:

http://www.math.umd.edu/~jnd/Remedial.Math.Problem.htm

The numbers of students needing remediation went from 63% in 1999 to 71% today. One eighth of the PGCC budget is allocated to remediation.

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Impressive Math Lesson Videos

Someone recently sent me a link to the Khan Academy’s site. This person has over 800 videos on YouTube teaching various math courses. The videos aren’t too long, but the amount of them is quite impressive. If your child is struggling with a concept, see if there isn’t something on this page they can review to get up to speed.

http://www.khanacademy.org/

Not only does he cover tons of math subjects, he also has a lot on finance including some analysis on the Geithner and Paulson plans.

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Teachers Can’t Teach?

Confused? Not if you like reform math. Found on the TERC website comes this nonsense:

http://investigations.terc.edu/library/bookpapers/constructivist_learning.cfm

“In reality, no one can teach mathematics. Effective teachers are those who can stimulate students to learn mathematics. Educational research offers compelling evidence that students learn mathematics well only when they construct their own mathematical understanding (MSEB and National Research Council 1989, 58).”