Customer Reviews

What's Math Got to Do with It?: Helping Children Learn to Love Their Least Favorite Subject--and Why It's Important for America

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This book, believe it or not, is a page-turner! As someone who works with children, I read with fascination Dr. Boaler's description of exactly what I have seen among my students, my own children, and even my friends: how math in school has alienated so many of us from its true nature and its usefulness in the real world. The first half of the book identifies problems and why they are urgent, and the last half shows some things we we can do about it. It also has a lot of references so that when I talk to parents I have some back-up. I am so glad I read it and think it is a must-read for parents and teachers.

What's Math Got to Do with It? is a good book to read if one attempts to stay updated with current trends in mathematics education among K-12 students. However, much of the examples is frankly normal, and remedies pointed out are better applied in idealistic situations. What Jo Boaler is trying to convey in her hopes of better mathematical education doesn't realistically work at all. Her ideas are better suited for top 10 to 20% of the mathematics students in the country, but forget about it for the rest of them. They don't care about the subject or have better priorities regardless of the effects on their lives. I know anyone can learn mathematics, but it's really up to them if they are motivated to do so. That's the more ultimate problem facing children today: what is their motivation in life? And the ultimate problem facing educators today is: how can they motivate their students to find education all important? Yes, highly trained/qualified teachers, especially in mathematics, are greatly needed because what matters the most is: pedagogy. To me, pedagogy is excellent among K-12 teachers as compared to university professors, but the latter group is so horrible, thus creating many tuned out college students and possible aspiring math majors. So either a student is one of the strongest surviving members of the process of earning a mathematical degree or is turned away to easier majors. It could be that IQ may be in play. But at college levels, I still suspect that bad pedagogy is more of a factor. Why is this important, you ask? Well, the nation wants highly trained mathematics teachers. Then, this is an area where you get the best of the best. I am sorry to say that teachers who majored in mathematics education while at same time taking so few albeit simple mathematics classes aren't worth it; yes, there is a certain percentage of them that will go on to be outstanding mathematics teachers, but let's be real: there is a great reason for them to take the easy way out. They are just inferior when it comes to working with mathematics of all levels, from arithmetic to advanced calculus including real analysis, modern algebra, modern geometry, and differential equations. The nation need teachers who are masters of science and art of computation and application of theories. Those are the one that can convey mathematical ideas with confidence and ease to younger students because they've been there before; they did all of the work, the toil and the thousands of pages worked on. Ultimately, what's left is pedagogy. Sadly to say, it's an area that is often very neglected at university levels, especially in graduate school. It's like saying, "Congratulations! You can do the math," but there is, "But can you teach it as well as you can do the math?" That takes confidence too.
Elsewhere in the pages, the author mentions the ability grouping to be a damning effect on all students. To be honest with you, life will always be like that. Students who scored well on mathematics portion of a national assessment test will always be placed into an accelerated paced class from the beginning because they care about their education, consciously or not, more than other distractions that go on in their lives. That's why they took school more seriously than their peers. When every freshman enters high school, they can make choices and be given more power to control their education. For example, everybody in my class of 525 students was given a piece of paper. For English, we had a choice of picking level 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 English where 1 is Honors and 5 is the most basic. For Science, one can take level 1 to 5 earth or physical science or biology which was one grade ahead than normal. For math, it was level 1 to 5 pre-algebra, algebra, or algebra II (which was one grade ahead). Everybody picked what they wanted, and of course, the most popular pickings were: Home Economics, Woodworking, Photography, etc. when they could have picked more academic classes. Similarly for college, people pick what they want. Usually, it's geared towards to Communications, English, Media, etc. That's how life is: people usually want the easy way out, avoiding hard work as much as possible. Why? Because they want to enjoy life more, at least that's what they think.
One thing the author talked about in her book is a topic that I never gave any thought about which is about gender differences and how learning is different for girls from boys. That was a pretty good education for me. I just didn't realize about it.
I understand that Jo wanted to have fun with seemingly advanced mathematical problems incorporated in the book. Sorry, many students today don't care about them, and quite frankly, I don't even care about them. These students are still struggling with how to add 1/4 to 2/5 or how to do 3 - 17 x 2 + 15 / 3. As she mentions that rote drill-drill-drill is too damaging and terrifying for many students in mathematics, I am sorry to say, but that's reality. If one cannot master basics and concepts of arithmetic and algebra, there is just no way of progressing to Calculus and beyond unless a student's IQ is like 150 or higher or is a Ramanujan or Will Hunting and is able to prove mathematical theories or create new mathematics. Basically, it takes a caring teacher with excellent pedagogy to get the students trained, even through rote drill-drill-drill, and be ready for tougher problems and critical thinking. Otherwise, Woodworking sounds like a great idea.
Finally, no research is provided by the author; just all anecdotal experiences. Sorry, that's not good enough for me. What she said about tracking and detracking...not true. False. Wrong. I just thought it would have been more interesting if the author could instead examine what works and why in Asia and compare them to the traditional ways in USA. My beliefs will probably be met: hard work produced by the students is the difference. All in all, good book...I enjoyed it, but it was too long for me.

A book review in the January 2011 edition of The American Mathematical Monthly highly recommended What's Math Got To Do With It? Having read the book, I recommend it without reservation to any teacher of mathematics from elementary school through college and to parents of children in math classes at any level. Jo Boaler is an internationally known expert in mathematics education and a scholarly advocate of the mathematics reform movement. In addition to all the interesting studies that Dr. Boaler presents in support of her positions, the book has the benefit of being a very easy read. So much of what she said rang true to me based upon my experiences as a student and a teacher in math classes and upon my work in industry as a mathematical modeler.

This book is written for parents and teachers and provides a realistic view of what is happening in today's schools regarding mathematics.

This book is a straight-forward, easy to read analysis of why so many of us HATE math, why it is so important for schools to turn this situation around, and what we can do to change the situation. Boaler argues that the math that we learn in school is no longer the math that we need in our lives and provides excellent examples to illustrate her points.

A must - read for all parents of school-aged children as well as citizens who want to understand how we can solve this critical problem.

This book is very good for understanding the feelings behind the reform math movement. But I give it only one star because it is so far out of touch with real math teaching and authentic research.

The problem reform math has with providing sufficient rigor is not addressed in the book. Traditional math advocates are most often concerned with the lack of rigor in reform curricula. Boaler provides anecdotes about certain classes of reform math students doing well on certain standardized tests - and a lot of time denigrating the tests they do not perform well on - but she doesn't speak to how reform students perform in college.

Math remediation rates are in excess of 50% for students entering college in Washington State (kids entering college need to take high-school level classes in college before they are ready for real college work). Reform math does not seem to be addressing that.

All of her ideas assume an excellent teacher. The anecdotes about Railside and with the summer school are all really about an excellent teacher stepping in and communicating a love of math to kids. Boaler is obviously a very inspiring math teacher herself, but she says little in the way of how an average teacher can miraculously get the same results.

My third big problem is her lack of scientific research. It's well documented that Boaler does not do peer-reviewed research. Her "research" is anecdotes from hand chosen students and schools with specific, excellent teachers. She has never provided data to back up her conclusions like a real scientist. Boaler has opinions; not science. Her opinions are interesting, but her research should not be treated representing facts.

I did like some of the things she said -

The discussion of "number flexibility" or number sense or how to "de-compose and re-compose" numbers was very good and it makes a lot of sense. I've seen my kids doing that, and my engineer husband has always done that. She is right that it wasn't taught before, and I agree that it's an improvement to include it in math classes.

I like the idea of "math talks" for better understanding of the material. But again, whether that works depends heavily on the teacher.

Tracking:

Kids will not be able to take calculus in high school unless they're in the "honors" math track. They need algebra in 8th grade in order to get through geometry, trig/alg 2, pre-calculus and calculus in high school. I guess if these were all provided in a de-tracked environment, parents might be more willing - but there aren't enough years to fit it all in. Boaler outlines a way it can all fit, but it sounds kind of expensive and risky (90 minute classes, cramming a full year of math into ½ year). I notice that Boaler does not recommend de-tracking unless this course of study is in place.

I can't believe Boaler gets away with saying that Japan does not use tracking in its school system. Japanese elementary students are not tracked, but every single Japanese high school student is tracked. Japanese public high schools are each rated for academic rigor (a variety of rigor/track options are provided) and students must take a high-stakes test to get in. Schools offering more rigor are harder to test into and are in great demand. My brother-in-law just got back from teaching English in Japan. He worked in the low-track high school for a time. Again - I just can't believe Boaler can get away with saying Japan does not track.

Boaler maintains her "research" shows that lower level students do much better when classes are not tracked. Real (peer-reviewed) research on tracking shows that the high-track students do better when tracked and the low students score the same in tracked or de-tracked classes (no effect).

Everyone in the US agrees that something must be done about our K-12 math education. In this book, the author advocates a curriculum which encourages student participation, discussion, and investigation, against what she calls the more "traditional" approach of the teacher demonstrating a particular method on the board and the students being forced to practice it in silence in the classroom. She argues that the "traditional" method encourages the student to try to memorize "an infinite ladder" of procedures completely disconnected from reality, while the more interactive method encourages the student to think and view math as a useful tool for problem solving. Various student responses to interviews are provided as evidence of the effectiveness of the new method.

Unfortunately, the evidence that the author presents is mostly anecdotal, often quoting only a few student responses which bolster the author's claims. For any teaching method, it is always possible to find examples in which it is implemented badly, and the examples the author sites as failures of the "traditional" method seem to be just that. Only the most unqualified teacher would teach math in the "traditional" way, as depicted by the author, no matter what the curriculum is. It is a telltale indication that the teacher him/herself, does not really understand the material at all, and that he/she him/herself sees math as an infinite ladder of procedures to memorize. Good teachers always encourage student participation, discussion, and investigation in one way or another. The technique of decomposing and recomposing numbers to do complicated calculations is of course taught, as well as why the FOIL method works. (Actually, the FOIL method is stupid and no teacher in their right mind would teach it.) In the end, as the author herself acknowledges, it is not the problem of the curriculum, but the teacher.

There are several important problems that the author fails to mention or address, or simply has not noticed, perhaps due to biased sampling in her research.

First, though most math teachers would like to teach students how to think and use math for problems solving, the majority of students actually resist it vehemently. They would rather be given a set of rules to memorize no matter how long, or stupid, the list is. They, in fact, demand it despite the fact they find it boring and hate it. Just take a look at any math textbook and all the formulas that are highlighted. This is the result of the publisher bowing to student demand that "important" formulas be locatable at a glance. The FOIL method for expanding polynomials was also invented as a response to student demand for a simple mnemonic device to memorize (a+b)(c+d)=ac+ad+bc+bd. Though this calculation is completely trivial and there is no need to memorize anything, most students simply refuse to try to understand how to derive the result and resort to memorization. In many ways, they are "asking for it."

The reason for this is quite simple: the students want maximum return for minimum investment. And for them, the return is their "grades" and the investment is their "time." The simplest way to achieve this is to memorize a few procedures just before the test, temporarily storing them in their short term memory, and then forget them completely afterward. "Understanding," which involves thinking hard about how and why the procedures work and committing them to long-term memory, requires a huge investment of their time that they would rather spend having fun. Few gifted teachers can convince students that such an investment would be worthwhile.

Another problem is that even in the "traditional" curriculum, the amount of "drilling" that US students receive is a bad joke compared to students in Asia. When seen through Asian eyes, US high school students do not study math at all. (Whatever they are doing now would not count in Asia.) As a result, US students are so unprepared when they enter college that they often struggle on math problems that Asian students would just breeze through. Asian students are no smarter than their US counterparts. They have just received enough drilling to the point that trivial calculations are indeed trivial to them. The US student, on the other hand, has to expend a lot of brain power to make sure the calculation is done correctly because he/she is so unsure of the result even for the most trivial of problems, and this exhausts them to the point that it negatively affects their ability to absorb new concepts and ideas. Teaching math at the college level is like trying to teach baseball to kids who are so unfit that they cannot make it to first base. And as far as I can tell, nothing has been done or even proposed to address this problem.

Overall, the book is an interesting read. Especially, chapters 8 and 9 which provides parents with various strategies to improve their children's math education. Chapter 6 on gender difference is also interesting, though I think the author's conclusions are biased. If you are the parent of a school age child, this book is a must read.


Note 1: though the author claims in chapter 1 that the Golden Ratio appears in various works of art and also in the proportions of the human body, such a myth is thoroughly defunct. It is unfortunate that a math educator would mention such nonsense. See, for instance, The Golden Ratio: The Story of PHI, the World's Most Astonishing Number by Mario Livio, or Number Theory: A Lively Introduction with Proofs, Applications, and Stories by James Pommersheim, Tim Marks, and Erica Flapan.

Note 2: Picture books by Greg Tang provide excellent material to teach kids the technique of decomposing and recomposing numbers. See, for instance:
Math-terpieces, Grapes Of Math (bkshelf) (Scholastic Bookshelf), Math For All Seasons (Scholastic Bookshelf).


Addendum: Since learning about the FOIL method in summer 2010 via reading this book (I had never heard of it before), I have been asking all my foreign educated colleagues (I work at an institute of higher education) what they thought of it whenever I get the chance. The reaction has always been the same: an initial shocked look of complete disbelief, followed by an uncontrollable bout of laughter. Their verdict is unanimous: it is the MOST STUPID method that they had ever heard of!

Author Boaler is to be commended for her focus on outcomes, including degree of pupil interest in further mathematics work. On the other hand, I don't understand why teachers are dictated to so much - let them choose the approach most comfortable for them, as long as pupil outcomes and interest are acceptable. Doing otherwise undermines staff motivation and precludes accountability. I did like the idea of making the subject more interesting with real world examples, though wonder why the teachers had to create these examples themselves - what are the book publishers being paid to do? On the other hand, I was disappointed that Boaler didn't examine math classes in Asia - where the pupils do really well!

Jo Boaler is the Marie Curie Professor of Mathematics Education at the University of Sussex in England, and has written an enjoyable and important book about mathematics education in our public schools. For the last seven years of my high school teaching career I employed "modeling" strategies to teach both chemistry and physics. In the workshop preparing me to employ the strategies, I had an astounding revelation about the relationship between physics and math. As I read pages 125 - 126 in Boaler's book I had a similar revelation about a math technique used by every algebra student. I found a great deal of joy in that revelation and I found both joy and dismay throughout the book.
In the chapter titled "What's Going Wrong in Classrooms," Boaler cites the importance of effective teachers in school success, and indicates that "Good teachers can make mathematics exciting even with a dreary textbook." She describes our silent math classrooms where students feel "disempowered and disenfranchised." She identifies the heart of the problem, writing "Over time, schoolchildren realize that when you enter Mathland you leave your common sense at the door."
Boaler opens chapter nine with a statement that I found to be true during my thirty-five years as a science teacher; "I'm a big supporter of public education, but it is hard to get away from the fact that math teaching across America is of low quality." The chapter concludes with details about numerous books and web sites that have information that can be used immediately. In concluding, Boaler writes "Mathematicians will tell you that the subject they care so much about is a living, connected and beautiful subject. This book is about giving all children, not only an elite few, the same important insights.
I feel very fortunate to have read this book and I am motivated to work to implement the ideas and strategies Jo Boaler advocates. Every person concerned with STEM education issues should read this book.

I expected more hands-on ways to teach math. This book was a rant against current math teaching and not very helpful. Basically the title was a lie. It doesn't give any real advice on how to help children learn to love math.