Thursday, October 3, 2013

Common Core "Mathlish"

The "old" 1st grader's homework used to look like this:




The new "rigorous" Common Core math is, well, not quite the same. 

Today's Common Core mathlish first grader brings home essentially the same homework page day in and day out.  These pages typically contain a few simple addition or subtraction problems.  The child is instructed to not just answer the question that they could/should be able to do in their head, but also draw pictures to correspond with each number in the problem.  Some pages require the child to come up with their own "mathlish sentence."  Considering many 1st graders are just starting to learn to read, shoving word problems at them does nothing but cause frustration and aggravation for both the child and the parent.  

On the backside of the homework page, the child is then conditioned to take tests and fill in a bubble.

See samples of these 1st grade pages for yourself.  Notice the student is reminded several times that they need to also draw the pictures, not just answer the problem, even if they can solve it in their head.