(512) 869-6284
(512) 869-6284
[email protected](This is an article from Stanford university Youcubed series)
By Jo Boaler Professor of Mathematics Education, co-founder youcubed
with the help of Cathy Williams, co-founder youcubed, & Amanda Confer Stanford University.
Updated January 28th, 2015
A few years ago a British politician, Stephen Byers, made a harmless error in an interview. The right honorable minister was asked to give the answer to 7 x 8 and he gave the answer of 54, instead of the correct 56. His error prompted widespread ridicule in the national media, accompanied by calls for a stronger emphasis on ‘times table’ memorization in schools. This past September the Conservative education minister for England, a man with no education experience, insisted that all students in England memorize all their times tables up to 12 x 12 by the age of 9. This requirement has now been placed into the UK’s mathematics curriculum and will result, I predict, in rising levels of math anxiety and students turning away from mathematics in record numbers. The US is moving in the opposite direction, as the new Common Core State Standards (CCSS) de-emphasize the rote memorization of math facts. Unfortunately misinterpretations of the meaning of the word ‘fluency’ in the CCSS are commonplace and publishers continue to emphasize rote memorization, encouraging the persistence of damaging classroom practices across the United States. Mathematics facts are important but the memorization of math facts through times table repetition, practice and timed testing is unnecessary and damaging. The English minister’s mistake when he was asked 7 x 8 prompted calls for more memorization. This was ironic as his mistake revealed the limitations of memorization without ‘number sense’. People with number sense are those who can use numbers flexibly. When asked to solve 7 x 8 someone with number sense may have memorized 56 but they would also be able to work out that 7 x 7 is 49 and then add 7 to make 56, or they may work out ten 7’s and subtract two 7’s (70-14). They would not have to rely on a distant memory. Math facts, themselves, are a small part of mathematics and they are best learned through the use of numbers in different ways and situations. Unfortunately many classrooms focus on math facts in unproductive ways, giving students the impression that math facts are the essence of mathematics, and, even worse that the fast recall of math facts is what it means to be a strong mathematics student. Both of these ideas are wrong and it is critical that we remove them from classrooms, as they play a large role in the production of math anxious and disaffected students. It is useful to hold some math facts in memory. I don’t stop and think about the answer to 8 plus 4, because I know that math fact. But I learned math facts through using them in different mathematical situations, not by practicing them and being tested on them. I grew up in the progressive era of England, when primary schools focused on the ‘whole child’ and I was not presented with tables of addition, subtraction or multiplication facts to memorize in school. This has never held me back at any time or place in my life, even though I am a mathematics education professor. That is because I have number sense, something that is much more important for students to learn, and that includes learning of math facts along with deep understanding of numbers and the ways they relate to each other.
In a critical research project researchers studied students as they solved number problems (Gray & Tall, 1994). The students, aged 7 to 13, had been nominated by their teachers as being low, middle or high achieving. The researchers found an important difference between the low and high achieving students – the high achieving students used number sense, the low achieving students did not. The high achievers approached problems such as 19 + 7 by changing the problem into, for example, 20 + 6. No students who had been nominated as low achieving used number sense. When the low achieving students were given subtraction problems such as 21-16 they counted backwards, starting at 21 and counting down, which is extremely difficult to do. The high achieving students used strategies such as changing the numbers into 20 -15 which is much easier to do. The researchers concluded that low achievers are often low achievers not because they know less but because they don’t use numbers flexibly – they have been set on the wrong path, often from an early age, of trying to memorize methods instead of interacting with numbers flexibly (Boaler, 2009). This incorrect pathway means that they are often learning a harder mathematics and sadly, they often face a lifetime of mathematics problems. Number sense is the foundation for all higher-level mathematics (Feikes & Schwingendorf, 2008). When students fail algebra it is often because they don’t have number sense. When students work on rich mathematics problems – such as those we provide at the end of this paper – they develop number sense and they also learn and can remember math facts. When students focus on memorizing times tables they often memorize facts without number sense, which means they are very limited in what they can do and are prone to making errors –such as the one that led to nationwide ridicule for the British politician. Lack of number sense has led to more catastrophic errors, such as the Hubble Telescope missing the stars it was intended to photograph in space. The telescope was looking for stars in a certain cluster but failed due to someone making an arithmetic error in the programming of the telescope (LA Times, 1990). Number sense, critically important to students’ mathematical development, is inhibited by over-emphasis on the memorization of math facts in classrooms and homes. The more we emphasize memorization to students the less willing they become to think about numbers and their relations and to use and develop number sense (Boaler, 2009).
Contact us to find out how we at Mathnasium of Cedar park work on the Number sense and Numerical fluency.
web address : https://www.mathnasium.com/cedarpark
For Full article, refer to : https://www.youcubed.org/fluency-without-fear/
