China modeled its new math curriculum after the 1989 U.S. math standards by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM). Many Chinese say it’s ruining math education, says a Phi Delta Kappan article by Yong Zhao.
The New Math Curriculum has been sharply criticized for betraying an excellent educational tradition, sacrificing mathematical thinking and reasoning for experiential learning, giving up disciplinary coherence in the name of inquiry learning, lowering expectations in the name of reducing students’ burden, and causing confusion among teachers and students.
Via Chris Correa, who notes how familiar this sounds.
Zhao argues that Chinese officials were too eager to abandon the strength of their programs (a rigorous and coherent math ciurriculum) to address their weaknesses: “students’ lack of creativity, an overemphasis on testing, a focus on memorization over application, a disconnection between school learning and real-life situations, and overworked students.”
Meanwhile, Americans are looking to China and other East Asian countries to learn how to teach math more effectively.
Most graduate engineering students come from Asia and plan to go home after a few years working in the U.S., says this EE Times article.
Going home wasn’t a very attractive option a decade or two ago, when all the good jobs were in America. Now, there are plenty of good jobs back home.. . . Some universities, such as Rice in Houston, are establishing scholarships targeted to American citizens. Some American-born engineering grad students say they feel isolated, with few friends to talk to in the cafeteria.
If we could just get India to adopt NCTM math maybe their students would stop acing the GREs.
This reminds me of an article a friend pointed me to years ago. About twenty years ago Japan’s economy was on fire, and people were talking about how America would soon become the number two economy in the world. The article was about how American lawyers were moving to Japan to start practicing there. My friend said if we exported enough lawyers it would both help out America, and hurt Japan.
Looks like we’re exporting mediocrity now as well.
Now if we only can export labor unions to China, our competitive problems are solved [it worked with Japan].