{"id":8967,"date":"2012-12-17T12:52:06","date_gmt":"2012-12-17T16:52:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/?p=8967"},"modified":"2012-12-17T12:54:13","modified_gmt":"2012-12-17T16:54:13","slug":"early-math-teachers-celebrate-critical-thinking-not-correct-answers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/early-math-teachers-celebrate-critical-thinking-not-correct-answers\/","title":{"rendered":"Early Math Teachers Celebrate \u2018Critical Thinking, NOT Correct Answers\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_pop\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/gallery\/share-button-gray.png\" style=\"border:0px\" alt=\"Share\" \/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"StumbleUpon\",\"Digg\",\"Reddit\",\"Bebo\",\"Delicious\");var hupso_icon_type = \"labels\";var hupso_background=\"#FFFFFF\";var hupso_border=\"#FFFFFF\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_twitter_via=\"wrightslaw\";var hupso_url=\"\";var hupso_title=\"Early%20Math%20Teachers%20Celebrate%20%E2%80%98Critical%20Thinking%2C%20NOT%20Correct%20Answers%E2%80%99\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div><p><strong>Please tell me this is a joke.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.ed.gov\/blog\/2012\/11\/early-math-teachers-celebrate-critical-thinking-not-correct-answers\/\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\">Early Math Teachers Celebrate \u2018Critical Thinking, Not Correct Answers\u2019<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p>This article begins by quantifying a serious long-standing problem:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Just 40 percent of 4th-graders and 35 percent of 8th-graders are proficient in math, according to the latest National Assessment of Educational Progress.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The article reports that the Erikson Institute will receive a 5 million dollar grant for teacher training in &#8220;new and high-potential practices to improve student learning.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>What does this new teacher training program do?<\/p>\n<p>The Institute will use the five million dollar grant to train teachers at 8 elementary schools to &#8220;lead classrooms that celebrate critical thinking, not correct answers.\u201d These teachers will ultimately &#8220;support&#8221; more than 4,500 students.<\/p>\n<p><strong>This program is not new or innovative.<\/strong> <!--more--><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s the same thinking and pedagogy that has characterized schools in the US for the last 40 years, as we fell further and further behind other countries.<\/p>\n<p>I cannot understand why the USDOE is spending a grant to train teachers in another wishy-washy, &#8220;there isn&#8217;t a correct answer&#8221; approach to teaching math.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why do you want math teachers who &#8220;celebrate&#8221; critical thinking, not correct answers? The beauty of math is that there ARE correct answers.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Why do you want to produce math teachers who &#8220;support&#8221; (but don&#8217;t teach) students?<\/p>\n<p>This is the same old teachers &#8220;support success&#8221; model that has failed.<\/p>\n<p>Since more than half of kids in the US are not proficient in math, we need to increase the number of teachers who are knowledgeable about math, and can teach kids how to solve math problems &#8230; and get correct answers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Please tell me this is a joke. Early Math Teachers Celebrate \u2018Critical Thinking, Not Correct Answers\u2019 This article begins by quantifying a serious long-standing problem: &#8220;Just 40 percent of 4th-graders <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/early-math-teachers-celebrate-critical-thinking-not-correct-answers\/\">Continue Reading \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1364,161],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-school-administration-school-culture","category-teachers"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8967"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9013,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions\/9013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wrightslaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}