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Re: the phrase "quick recall"--as someone involved in reviewing the CFPs, I should let you in on the fact the the phrase was a compromise to those traditionalists who couldn't deal with the phrase "automaticity of facts" or "automatic recall" or even "fast recall"--etc. [Ed: Huh?] "Quick recall" is the phrase used by those who support what appear to be the ideas expressed in your blog.... You cannot believe how many versions of this phrase were discussed and debated before NCTM made this compromise with those who are part of the Mathematically Correct camp....
I guess I would be critical too if I opposed the efforts of Skip Fennell and NCTM. I would be kicking myself for not coming up with and publishing the Focal Points myself.
For those who criticize the CFPs, and only comment on statements printed in various biased articles (some of which are taken out of context), I encourage you to read the 41 page document. [Ed: which I linked to and did, in fact, read] It's a free download. Most of the reporters, radio-show hosts, and journalists that I've spoken to in my state have not actually read the entire document, but focused more on the reform-traditional controversies that have been part of the Math Wars over "how to teach mathematics"--and not "what to teach."
I encourage you to spend some real time with the document (http://www.nctm.org/focalpoints), then develop a real opinion....
Thursday, January 11, 2007
out of the woodwork
Some anonymous knucklehead, claiming to be an NCTM insider, just left a comment to this post on D-Ed Reckoning discussing the new NCTM focal points. Either he or she screwed up the terminology and/or players or I am very confused:
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12 comments:
What the NCTM insider doesn't say is that the search for a phrase like "quick recall" was an attempt to avoid any reference to memory. Any form derived from this noun (e.g. memorize) causes dread among fuzzies.
I don't doubt that. I just don't see any "traditionalist" not liking the term "automatic recall"
Yeah, this just doesn't seem right.
What this commenter is getting at, I think, is that the NCTM moved away from the phrases "procedural fluency" and "computational fluency." These appear everywhere in the 2000 Principles document.
I do recall some infighting among proponents of more traditional instruction about the term "automaticity," but I don't think I ever really knew what that was about.
That does seem more accurate. I can see where one might have trouble with the vague term "fluency," sepecially considering the problems they are having with the same term on the reading side of the game. The whole language peopel are trying to define fleuncy as quick reading with comprehension as opposed to just quick reading. I'm pretty sure the constructivist people would have reied to refine fluency as quick recall/computation with understanding, effectively eliminating that requirement.
Upon first reading it seemed like a bit of snark to me. Why would people of the "Mathematically Correct crowd" not be able to handle the term automaticity? Especially since I only see that term used by the so-called "traditionalists" and never by the NCTM people?
Call me baffled, too.
Two possibilities:
(1) "Automaticity" is, on a superficial level, a bit snobby. I think it's fair to say that so-called traditionalists are suspicious of snobby.
(2) The term doesn't tell us what behaviors we should see (like "quick recall"). Thus, there is the possibility that it could be misused, which brings us back to (1).
Appropos to the issue of the focal points, Elizabeth Carson, who is Exec. Director of NYC HOLD (www.nychold.com) offers this perspective on the focal points:
April 13, 2000 --
"In an important about-face, the nation's most influential group of
mathematics teachers announced yesterday that it was recommending, in
essence, that the arithmetic be put back into mathematics, urging teachers
to emphasize the fundamentals of computation rather than focus on concepts
and reasoning."
"Yesterday, after being on the defensive for years, the council issued a
revision at its national convention here that critics and even some
supporters of the old curriculum said was a retreat. While not abandoning
its original agenda, the council added strong language to its groundbreaking
1989 standards, emphasizing accuracy, efficiency and basic skills like
memorizing the multiplication tables." (Math Teachers Back Return of
Education in Basic Skills,NYT, April 13, 2000)
April 23 2000 -- "THE National Council of Teachers of Mathematics reversed
themselves last week, saying students should know the right answers and must
be fluent in arithmetic computations such as multiplication, division,
addition and subtraction. " (Editorial, San Gabriel Valley News Chain)
Elizabeth comments:
Sound familiar? More than a little similar to the Focal points and press,
eh?
Its been almost seven long years since the last NCTM "about face."
Link to full NYT article below
Math Teachers Back Return of Education in Basic Skills, Anemona Hartocollis,
The New York Times, April 13, 2000
http://www.nytimes. com/library/ national/ 041300math- test.edu. html
chiming in....I can't imagine traditionalists, cognitive scientists, or mathematicians/engineers/physicists objecting to any phrase containing the term "automaticity" or "automatic" unless the terms was to be used in a context that rendered it meaningless.
Barry, that's priceless!
This is truly amazing, Barry.
At first I thought I was reading about Focal Points and that there must be a mistake with the date.
What impact will Focal Points have if the first dramatic "about-face" went virtually unnoticed?
The first massive reversal was accompanied by a thick tome:
The new document, the 402-page "-->Principles and Standards for School Mathematics," is the first major revision of the council's influential standards.
Some people may be interested in Bill Quirk's analysis of NTCM's volte face seven years ago in the form of the PSSM tome.
It beats me why the NYT and other publications keep trumpeting these alleged drastic reversals when there is less there than advertised.
Quirk thinks its propaganda fed by NCTM to placate critics of fuzzy math.
As it keeps feeling compelled to, NCTM set the record straight back then:
NCTM Speaks Out: Setting the Record Straight about changes in Mathematics Education.
When calculators can do multidigit long division in a microsecond, graph complicated functions at the push of a button, and instantaneously calculate derivatives and integrals, serious questions arise about what is important in the mathematics curriculum and what it means to learn mathematics. More than ever, mathematics must include the mastery of concepts instead of mere memorization and the following of procedures. More than ever, school mathematics must include an understanding of how to use technology to arrive meaningfully at solutions to problems instead of endless attention to increasingly outdated computational tedium. -NCTM, Commonsense Facts to Clear the Air
What's the date on this NCTM statement?
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