Regarding Tacoma high school students’ WASL math scores:
I teach science at Mount Tahoma High School and also work in an after-school math program. The students I deal with come from varied social and ethnic backgrounds and exhibit every level of academic ability. Many are not native English speakers.
Teaching science involves a certain amount of math, as much of science is expressed quantitatively. I have found many students unable to do the basic math necessary for science, which also reflects their WASL math ability.
This math is not particularly difficult – about sixth- or seventh-grade level – but many high school students are unable to perform at this level.
I find almost all my after-school math students are lacking in multiplication skills. This lack cripples their understanding of division, which in turn undoes them in fractions and so on, until they enter high school without the arithmetic skills necessary for doing “math.”
High schools are being blamed for low math scores because of students with deficient arithmetic skills who are not ready for middle school, much less high school-level math.
Multiplication is learned in the third and fourth grades, division and fractions in the fifth and sixth. It is here that many students are being lost to higher education.
This is not to blame elementary school teachers; they have a very full plate: large class sizes and students with every level of discipline or lack thereof and every level of understanding. A teacher simply does not have enough time to give each student the help he or she needs. Too much time is spent resolving behavioral and other issues in an overcrowded, often disruptive environment.
Much of this is also related to the “integrated” math programs, which don’t stress enough drill in arithmetic skills and allow kids to go on without the needed foundations to be successful in math and related subjects. Many students need calculators for the simplest multiplications and divisions.
Memorization and “drill-and-kill” methods are currently out of fashion in education, considered perhaps too repressive and too structured. As a result, many students don’t learn their multiplication tables. However, memory must still be considered an important component in thinking and learning.
We need to look at the whole of a student’s education, not just the last two or three years before graduation. Students at all levels, especially elementary school students, need smaller class sizes and more teacher time. They need more thorough drilling in basic arithmetic skills.
We did not get to the moon using integrated math and calculators; we got there by knowing our multiplication tables, understanding math and using slide rules.
Eric Knight lives in Port Orchard.
