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Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Singapore Math Update

I haven't posted much lately as I was pretty busy teaching 3rd grade, moving from Phoenix to Colorado, writing a Singapore Math professional development program (40 hours long!) for California and training the curriculum around the country (and Canada). I'm a full time trainer now with time to write and I thought you might be interested in an update on recent developments regarding Singapore Math in the U.S.

Oak Norton (Weapons of Math Destruction) reports that:
A small working group of legislators, officials from the state office of education, school board members, educators, industry leaders, and concerned parents have been meeting for the last several months to create the math future of Utah. This is the most exciting prospect for Utah's math future that has happened in the history of the state.
Under the heading of "Utah's Math Future, This *IS* Rocket Science" you will find a petition and more information on this initiative. Head on over and take a look at the proposal.

Other schools adopting Singapore Math this year include Scarsdale and Tarrytown, New York, Several schools in Montana and Colorado, numerous charter and private schools in Southern California, and Hall County, Georgia, which is expanding the program throughout the district (from a few pilot schools).

I've been spending a lot of time with some materials I picked up in Singapore last summer, working on my mental math skills. Here's a sample from the level 4 book:

Can you get the answers in 10 seconds?
36 x 11 = ?
243 x 11 = ?

Enjoy! I'll include the express strategy in the comments.
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4 comments:

  1. UnknownSeptember 9, 2008 at 7:13 PM

    36 x 11=?
    Add up the digits 3 and 6 to get the tens digit of the answer. The digit 3 forms the hundreds digit and the digit 6 remains as the ones digit.

    36 x 11 = 396

    243 x 11=?
    Add up the digits 2 and 4 to get the hundreds digit of the answer. Add up the digits 4 and 3 to get the tens digit. The digit 2 forms the thousands digit and the digit 3 remains as the ones digit.

    243 x 11 = 2673

    ReplyDelete
  2. le radical galoisienSeptember 10, 2008 at 7:39 PM

    Does this change if you switch base systems?

    ReplyDelete
  3. AllisonSeptember 10, 2008 at 10:30 PM

    what did you and your group do to get singapore math adopted in these schools? what did it take?

    ReplyDelete
  4. UnknownSeptember 15, 2008 at 10:56 AM

    Allison-
    Schools typically come to me after they have made a decision. Some have attended trainings I have done at other schools and persuaded their school to adopt Singapore Math. Other schools attended one of the many 30 minute curriculum presentations that were done last winter throughout California after the materials were approved for use.

    ReplyDelete