Matching Tracksuits

There’s an op-ed piece in today’s New York Times about the ineffectiveness of “fuzzy math” instruction:

One of the most infamous fads took root in the late 1980’s, when many schools moved away from traditional mathematics instruction, which required drills and problem solving. The new system, sometimes derided as “fuzzy math,” allowed children to wander through problems in a random way without ever learning basic multiplication or division. As a result, mastery of high-level math and science was unlikely. The new math curriculum was a mile wide and an inch deep, as the saying goes, touching on dozens of topics each year.

I was shocked about this time last year when I was substitute teaching for a few weeks at the level of math juniors and seniors were working on. “We did that in fourth grade,” was K’s response.

K, studying for a national licensing exam for the last few weeks, recently revealed that the math she was working was “fun.” Matrices and such. “When did you learn that?” I asked, fearful of how her response might indict American education.

“Well, we started learning about it in primary school.” Around seventh grade (at the time, primary school in Polska was K-8).

Now some American educators are aiming for algebra by the seventh grade:

Under the new (old) plan, students will once again move through the basics — addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and so on — building the skills that are meant to prepare them for algebra by seventh grade. This new approach is being seen as an attempt to emulate countries like Singapore, which ranks at the top internationally in math.

The question is, what are students in Singapore studying in seventh grade math? I’d be willing to bet that, like in Poland, they’ve left algebra far behind by seventh grade.

The answer to catching up with some parts of the world in the education level of our schools lies not only in curriculum changes – rearranging deck chairs in the oft-used cliche. The answer depends, in part, on more educational time: a longer school day and a longer school year.

At the day treatment facility where I work, we use the Teaching Family Model (see Teaching Family Association), a method of behavior modification that at first seems a little silly, but becomes more reasonable the more I work with it.

Basically, it’s point system, with each student (or “consumer” in the social services parlance) having a point card, which staff members use to help the consumer (really, I hate that term; what is being consumed?) keep track of beneficial and detrimental behaviors. Basically, for doing something good, they earn positive points, and that word choice is critical — we’re not to say we “give” them the points. For doing something negative, they earn negative points.

“Bob, I really liked the way you took the initiative when you saw the trash needed to be taken out. Take your point card out, please. I think you’ve earned a thousand points for that.”

“Sam, I need you to take your point card out. You know that using profanity is socially unacceptable, and can really lead to a bad impression of you as an individual in many situations. I need you to take of four thousand points for swearing…”

The points are then used as a gauge for moving up through the treatment levels, each of which requires more responsibility, but also has more privileges.

Usually, we staff members tie their points into their individual goals for the day, or their general program goals. That way we’re reinforcing the same basic things, rather than assessing random behavior.

“It all seems so artificial,” I initially thought. “People don’t go through life with point cards.” But watching the behaviors the students (I’m their teacher — I shall call them “students”! What assertiveness…) struggle with, I came to a different conclusion.

While no one carries point cards in the “real world,” we do go through our day assessing points mentally. If we meet someone who reluctantly holds out his hand when he meets us, weakly shakes our hand, mumbles, and refuses to make eye contact, we assign that individual negative points in our mind, consciously or not. On the other hand, meeting someone who seems gifted in conversation and immediately draws us to him/her racks up positive points. That’s what “making a good impression” is: positive points on our mental score card.

Making points depends on following the rules of society, which has “decided” that certain things are acceptable, others are not. Yet many of the students I work with are not aware of these rules — the rules of the game, one might say.

Soon after I’d started working at the facility, I was having a conversation with another staff member in the presence of the students, and the student butted in to tell me how I was wrong, how what I was saying was stupid, and how anyone with any sense would no better. Now, his tone was not overtly disrespectful, but his interruption certainly was, as was what he actually said. When I told him to give himself negative points for being disrespectful, he was genuinely puzzled, not to mention angered. A heated discussion almost ensued. Instead, we were able to calm him and explain that, while he might not have intended any disrespect by it, I felt it was disrespectful. “And unfortunately,” I explained, “disrespect doesn’t depend solely on the definition of the speaker, but also — more so, even — it depends on the definition of the listener.”

The Teaching Family Model’s point card system simply tries to make students aware of the mental point assessment that’s going on all around them. It’s intended to help them keep a positive score on the mental scorecard of those in authority.

Whether it works or not, I can’t say. Much of it depends on consistency. Perhaps key, though, is making sure the students don’t see point deductions as punishment, which is much more difficult than it might seem. Privileges depend on the number of points a student might have. There are “gates” at our program, thought they might be described as levels. With each gate come more privileges, as well as more responsibilities. Moving up to the next gate, in turn, depends on having a certain number of cumulative points. This is certainly not the only thing necessary to move up a gate, but it is an important facet. To gain points, a student must be consistently improving his social skills. Thus, taken altogether, it’s easy to see how students view a point deduction as a punishment. It’s too abstract for some of them to think of the staff as simply score keepers working within a framework imposed, even on us, from the outside.