Battleground Schools Reading

During the reading of the article about the fraught history of mathematics education and the curriculum in North America, I had 3 stops- Progressivist reform movement for math, New math reform movement, and “Math –wars” based on NCTM Standard form.

The Progressivist reform movement for math wanted that the students understand the importance of learning math by doing the activity and effective inquiry so that they find out alternative ways to get the answers instead of memorizing the math rules without a sense of "why". I think that the reform movement helped the students to give importance to "doing" math rather than "knowing" math.

Reading about the new method reform movement, I realized how the movement made changes in the math curriculum so that schools play an essential role to generate a bright math future generation. In other words, the universities and National Council of the teaching of mathematics had to rewrite the Mathematics curriculum for elementary and secondary schools so that students become familiar with the foundation of advanced math concepts at the school levels. As a result, they become an expert on math when they are attending University. I think that it is a really important movement.

Lastly, I stopped at "Math-Wars" based on the NCTM standards Form. I tried to understand how the progressive and constructivist approaches were influenced to NCTM standards, and why parents formed lobby groups like "HOLD" (honest open and logical debate) to oppose the standard positions.  I think that “Math-Wars” were debates between parents who were worried about their children's academic careers and NCTM standards.