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As things stood until equality laws covered education many times girls had a difficult time even getting into the high school or college math classes needed for a not only a degree in that or science, but the foundation for say pre-med. Girls were shunted into becoming nurses, medicine was a man's world; or so the thought went.
The United States actually does well on international tests. When broken down by the groups tracked by No Child Left Behind you will find that each group does quite well when compared to their counterparts in other countries:
Really good math education starts in Preschool and Kindergarten. That's where you lay your foundation for number sense. Do you know of any public preschool or public kindergarten teachers in the US who hold math degrees? Or who feel confident in algebra and beyond? Yeah, me neither. The closest you can get here is Montessori.
I was going to say the same thing...Montessori. I have 2 children that went to two different schools in their early years (K-1) The oldest went to a well-regarded Catholic School because there was no space in the Montessori school that we wanted. The youngest was lucky enough to get into the Montessori school, when the time came, right out of the gate. I know from 1st hand experience, that the Montessori method far and away exceeds all of the other math programs they threw at my oldest. Now she hates math. The youngest says that math is her favorite subject because she feels comfortable with the numbers, and best of all, its fun. I lament the fact that the oldest didn't have as solid a foundation, and that her number sense is shaky, at best. We secured a former Montessori teacher as a math tutor and are hoping to undo the damage.
In the post you quoted I talked about students not being ready for what they are being taught. I do think that part of our problem is that we push math down to lower and lower levels thinking if we start earlier we'll get better results but we don't.
I also think we fail to hold our students accountable for what they do learn and they have come to expect review after review after review. These are two different problems.
IME girls tend to develop math ability sooner than boys. I teach 9th and 10th graders math and the girls as a group seem to struggle less. That's not to say that I don't have girls who struggle I just have more boys that struggle.
That's interesting. I remember in grade school, the stragglers in reading skills were boys, and some of us girls were asked to help the boys. But isn't it generally believed that boys are better at abstract thinking? That's touted to explain why so many boys and so few girls go into engineering. Maybe that ability comes when they're a little older, and beyond 9th grade algebra and 10th grade geometry.
There is clearly something terribly wrong with the US primary education system. I don't work in this field nor do I have children so it's not easy for me to put my finger on the issue as well as a solution. However when we rank so low compared to other countries there is something seriously wrong. Throwing money at a broken system is clearly not working.
I would not call a rise from 150 to 152 much of an improvement.
Quote:
Still, we can say that science performance among eighth-graders improved slightly between 2009 and 2011, with the average score rising from 150 to 152 (on a 0-to-300 scale). In 2011, just 32% were rated proficient or better, while a third were rated “basic” (indicating partial mastery of the material) and 35% were below basic.
Quote:
In a new Pew Research Center report, only 29% of Americans rated their country’s K-12 education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (known as STEM) as above average or the best in the world. Scientists were even more critical: A companion survey of members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science found that just 16% called U.S. K-12 STEM education the best or above average; 46%, in contrast, said K-12 STEM in the U.S. was below average.
There is clearly something terribly wrong with the US primary education system. I don't work in this field nor do I have children so it's not easy for me to put my finger on the issue as well as a solution. However when we rank so low compared to other countries there is something seriously wrong. Throwing money at a broken system is clearly not working.
White Americans scored higher than large western countries like the U.K, France and Germany. Asian Americans scored higher than Japan and South Korea.
That doesn't sound to me like something is terribly wrong with the U.S. primary educational system.
There really isn't for those sub-groups. It's other sub-groups which are plateaued or dropping and for which, as I've mentioned, all the educational programs have been implemented over the last thirty years.
White Americans scored higher than large western countries like the U.K, France and Germany.
Asian Americans scored higher than Japan and South Korea.
Hispanic Americans scored way higher than all Latin American countries.
That doesn't sound to me like something is terribly wrong with the U.S. primary educational system.
Looking at which country we scored higher than is not a good way to assess. Look at were we stand in the rankings overall.
The most recent PISA results, from 2012, placed the U.S. an unimpressive 35th out of 64 countries in math and 27th in science. If you think the US being a very well developed country scoring 35th out of 64 countries tells me there is something is terribly wrong with the U.S. primary educational system.
Also in looking at this chart it's not very impressive to see a country as advanced as ours with scores as low as this. We should be in the top 5-10% but we're about in the middle. Now tell me again how there is no issue with our primary math and science education here in the US?
There is an easy way to improve ranking. Restrict immigration from Latin America and give more quotas to Asians, especially East Asians. In a decade, our PISA ranking will be in top 5. It is crazy. It has no chance to become law. But, it will actually work.
@ bill83-Using some "quick math" myself, I calculate that the US' math score was about 15% lower than the highest country's. The science score was about 10% lower. I'm not sure what the Pew Research Center considers "significantly" higher/lower.
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We secured a former Montessori teacher as a math tutor and are hoping to undo the damage.
