Monday, November 21, 2011

I Am So Cutting Edge

Before I discuss all the ways (one) in which I am cutting edge, I just want to revisit the whole teacher thing.  You know from my last post that I am all about teachers.  I love me some teachers.  But, here's the thing...there are a few issues.  I don't want to blame all teachers; it's probably just a select few evil ones who decide on world-wide curriculum.


This is the extent of
my math ability.
I would say that my main complaints are math-focused.  Everyday Math to be exact.  Long story short, people suck at math so educators decided to find a better way to teach math; something more intuitive.  Awesome.  We can all get on board with that.  After that is where I part ways with Everyday Math.  Aside from teaching kids to count in their head the way they would count money, i.e., big numbers first, the rest is a big disaster.  Okay, it's not a big disaster if you don't care about looking like you're an idiot to your 7 year old when you try to explain subtraction and are met with a look of pity and disdain.


Children no longer "borrow," they "redistribute."  Complete bullshit.  It doesn't matter that it's not really borrowing, your 2nd grader understands the concept of borrowing, she does not have a f#*@ing clue what the word "redistribute" means.  Next - lattice method multiplication.  Problem one - kids don't know what a lattice is so calling it that doesn't conjure up any connection for them.  Problem two - you already can't read their smudgy, dull, indecipherable pencil numbers, why are we making it worse by asking them to make a diagonal grid in a one-inch space.  And then have them put the numbers into the tiny diamonds?


Wait.  There's a way
to check your work?
I could next go on about the meaninglessness of advanced math but I fear perhaps I will come across unstable or unduly bitter (too late?), so I will just move on to the actual topic of the post.  My cutting edgedness.  And my ability to make up my own words, like "edgedness."


Anyway, so here it is...Ta Da!!!...I am now on Twitter.  I figured out how to get on all by myself and set everything up.  I really don't know what I am supposed to do over there, I mean you can't even "like" anyone's comments, but I am so 21st century blogger now.  I had a personal account which I never used, but while I was fooling around last night, I did comment on something Boy wrote.  One of his friends "favorited" it (a lame-ass substitute for "like") and by morning Boy had erased my comment.  I considered commenting on the fact he did that, but figured it would spur on teenage unpleasantness.


My next big accomplishment will be switching my domain name to Google and then making my URL a ".com" versus a "blogspot.com."  That ought to send me over the edge (past cutting edge if you will) trying to figure it out.  If I do not have to be hospitalized/medicated after that I want to figure out how to get the formatting on the actual blog to behave.   I would ask The Party to help me, but, one - he's still in Paris, and two - it will likely devolve into our usual conversation which is "You're stupid" "No, you're stupid."  Said with love of course.


The Blue Hen wants you
to know it's important to
go to at least "1" class a week.
If you want to appear old and not cutting edge, then I recommend that you walk around during a tour of your college campus with your child and point out what used to be in each of the spots mentioned on the tour.  This will make your child roll his eyes and make the tour guide wish you would stop talking.  LG (of New Orleans fame) and I took our 11th graders on a tour of University of Delaware (where we both went, as did our husbands).  We had a lovely visit with each other and the boys liked the school, but we definitely did not come off as being hip and cool.  On the upside, there was one set of parents who kept hugging and kissing, while their son stood off to the side trying to pretend he wasn't with them.  We were definitely way less embarrassing than them, so that was something.  PS - go Blue Hens.

9 comments:

  1. Does this now make you a twit?
    Love,
    Mom

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  2. I would hate to see your comments start to get mysteriously deleted. Just saying. Love, Me

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  3. Would have loved to hv seen you and the party at UD homecoming. It is a crime that the stone balloon and the down under no longer exist. I am certain you were the coolest mom on the tour. Bc xoxo

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  4. Funniest was that you were talking so much to the tour guide that at one point he forgot that he was giving a tour and thought he was just in a conversation with you until someone snapped him out of it. :) Ummmmm..and hellooooo we are hip and cool. -Love, LG

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  5. Seriously?!?!?! Are you TRYING to kill me?!?!? It is like you wrote a special blog just for me and then ignored blaming all math errs on me! :)

    Let me explain Everyday Math......Ready.....if you are a relatively above average student, this is a GREAT curriculum. However, if you are a student that needs additional help...IT SUCKS!!!!!! And I don't know about other districts, but the transition from Everyday Math to the middle years curriculum sucks! However, having said that......I LOVE Lattice!!!!! and I teach algebra....so there! Also, I don't know about the redistributing crap, but doing what it is that I do, I don't care what the hell they call it, so long as they can do it!

    That's all! Love you - oh, and obviously, you didn't have a math teacher as amazing as my students and therefore are quite bitter. Just saying!

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  6. Stef,

    funny that you should say math "errs" versus "errors" - just saying.

    Further, you could have saved some time on your looonnnnggggg explanation of Everyday Math by just saying blah blah blah - because that is all I heard.

    Oh yeah - and of course, love you too. xo

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  7. Stef, your students are amazing math teachers??

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  8. Helloooooo, new here because of one chunky mama! MathS is the same over here. The gov thinks if we give the children lots of ways to do the four operations, they will choose the one they are most comfortable with. They get taught swiftly and moved on.
    The result?
    Stepford child ( only 1 a class these days ) gets all the methods Easily.
    Joe bloggs mr MoR can't do any of them completely so messes up, loses interest and gives up and starts to switch off.
    MY SEN children don't stand a chance.

    We do 'chunking' which, when it was introduced totally blew my mind! It took ME ages to grasp the concept, and as a stepford, I can understand all the steps and can do it.now. What was wrong with the bog standard bus stop??!!
    I think your lattice is equal to our partitioning! Man, that causes so much 'fun'.
    Also we start to teach long column sumns backwards. We are not allowed to borrow n go next door either. Also we have to say 'negative' instead of minus. Grrrrr , you know sometimes kids do not NEED to 'understand ' what they are doing, they just need to learn it BECAUSE THE TEACHER SAUD SO!
    Anyway guess what? With my little group I always use the methods I was taught, eventually they get the method and because they now get their sums - sorry, number sentences ( for crying out loud) right they are happy, proud of themselves, self esteem gies up, less disruption in class, I tell the teacher I work with , hey, they just are choosing the method that works for them!
    But the danger zone I think is mr n mrs Joe blogs, in a few years ( when it will be too late for them) someone in charge somewhere, who has never been in a school will dream up new bonkers mathS ( I need that S. I'm English!)
    I'm going to use this as a blog post too! Nice to meet ya !
    Rachel xx

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  9. Hi Rachel! Welcome!

    So I am getting that you are not a mathS/math lover either. Excellent, you'll fit right in. :)

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