Interesting conversaiton with a PS algebra teacher

[Valerie(TX)]

Last week I was waiting for an appointment and struck up a convo with another very nice lady who was also waiting. Turns out she was a former engineer who has been teaching high school maths for 12 years. She had recently moved to a new school district and is teaching six sections of algebra 1 this year...has a little over 150 students.

She mentioned that, in her experience, homeschooled student sometimes are well-grounded in math, but other times they really lack a decent foundation. I told her I could imagine that might be true; we were pretty sold on the importance of math since engineers and computer programmers run in the family. :) (Pretty diplomatic, yeah??)

When I taught two years of Spanish two years ago, the part that nearly killed me was grading, so I asked her about that. How in the world does she manage grading that many homework sets, etc.? Her reply was that the school districts (both the old and the new) are officially encouraging teachers not assign homework (it sounded like this was an overall PC push of some kind, the way she worded it), and there was no way she could grade that much homework, so she has a system: she tells the kids that they have to do a minimum of seven problems in class, and if they do ten and then show them to her, they don't have any homework. She said that she does not keep homework grades, but that she puts a checkmark in her gradebook for every set that she looks at (what she explained was more what I'd call "looking over", as opposed to "correcting" or "grading") I asked her if she enforced the "show me or do more at home" policy, and she said there was no way she could do that. Realistically, the students' grades came down to what they were able to produce on the multiple choice tests.

!!!! The irony of this did not escape me...given where she started.

[SusanAR]

Realistically, the students' grades came down to what they were able to produce on the multiple choice tests.

!!!! The irony of this did not escape me...given where she started.

I had a conversation with a math teacher from the local CC. He said that I should give M/C tests because that is the format of SAT/ACT etc. I was really surprised!

Susan

[Peggy in Va]

Unfortunately, this sounds very familiar. I can't remember the exact policy of our school district, but I know the head 5th grade teacher at youngest ds school doesn't believe in homework. The only homework he ever has is to read 15-20 min./night.

When we put our dss in school a couple of yrs ago, we got very lucky in that my middle ds was assigned to a teacher that I had know for yrs. She had previously taught at the private school oldest ds had attended. Because of that background, she had her kids doing work that none of the other 4th grade classes were doing.:) The school moved her up to 5th grade and I requested that ds be assigned to her, she and I were both amazed that the policy was "no homework". Youngest ds has her this yr; and while I am grateful she is his teacher, the policy is still "no homework".

I find it interesting because according to many of the teachers, the general consensus is, if the kids don't understand the material, why are we having them practice making the same mistakes at home. Yet, when I was on the district gifted & talented advisory committee, the main complaint from parent teachers who were also on the board was that the kids weren't being prepared for high school, much less college. They would also comment that the honors classes were no longer true honors classes because they were allowing kids who had no business in there to take the classes.:confused:

It's very sad, but it's also the reason why middle ds is in a private school this yr and both dss are coming back home next yr. The one middle school (6th & 7th grades) we have has not met "annual yearly progress", according to NCLT, in math and english for two yrs in a row now. The real kicker is, if we had another middle school (that wasn't failing), the students would be given the option of attending it. But (and it's a big but), the students that would be given first priority would be those that are at risk of failing. In other words, send the kids that are failing to a school that is doing o.k., during that time the school that's failing can bring its scores back up, and if the school that's not failing does poorly for a year it's o.k., because the failing kids will go back to their original school the next yr. Talk about CYA. And yet there is a state directive to push all 8th graders to take Alg. 1. Pleaseeeee, we have 5th graders here who can't even add or subtract without counting on their fingers. Yep, very, very sad.

Thanks for letting me ramble. I've just reaffirmed, in my own mind, all the reasons for bring dss back home next yr.

[Janet in WA]

My experience with high school math homework (both when I was in high school and since) was that it was a tool for the student to practice the concepts, not something to be graded like a test. Typically, the students are assigned the problems for which the answers are in the back of the book. If the teacher "checks" homework, it is to give credit for its having been done -- not for its having been done correctly.

Of course, this puts the responsibility on the student to use the homework for true practice and learning. Like most things about traditional schools, the student gets out of it what he wants to. This is one reason we homeschooled our younger two sons. I didn't want them to be allowed to opt out of learning math (which is exactly what my oldest, non-homeschooled son did). Here at home, we checked every problem in every problem set every day, and my two younger sons learned math, whether they wanted to or not.

[chaik76]

I find this thread very interesting, because the push in our area is for more homework. My first grader had at least forty-five minutes a night this year. I really think with fifty minutes (or forty or whatever) or thereabout, practice problems in class, and the ability to go to teachers if there is a problem (I know that isn't always possible) that homework is unnecessary. By the time kids get up, spend time busing to school, spend seven hours in school, and bus home, they've often been gone ten hours per day. Adding in multiple hours of homework just isn't useful.

[ksva]

If the teacher "checks" homework, it is to give credit for its having been done -- not for its having been done correctly.

Whoa! I wish I had gone to your school! :lol: Everything single thing we did was graded - pop quizzes, homework, tests - all of it. And all put together to churn out our grades on our report cards, which came out every six weeks. (This was in the '60's and '70's, btw.)

Kathy

[Peggy in Va]

My experience with high school math homework (both when I was in high school and since) was that it was a tool for the student to practice the concepts, not something to be graded like a test. Typically, the students are assigned the problems for which the answers are in the back of the book. If the teacher "checks" homework, it is to give credit for its having been done -- not for its having been done correctly.

This was true in my middle ds case. He started out in Alg 1 this yr., his teacher would assign approximately 4 or 5 problems a night and then gave credit for problems attempted. Not whether they were correct or not. However, she always went over them in class the next day.

[Valerie(TX)]

I really think with fifty minutes (or forty or whatever) or thereabout, practice problems in class, and the ability to go to teachers if there is a problem (I know that isn't always possible) that homework is unnecessary. <<snip>> Adding in multiple hours of homework just isn't useful.

Several thoughts:

1) I think I'm there with you on the first grade homework issue, but we're talking about high school math. The value that I would see for first graders would be in review of their material; the benefit of seeing again might be worth the time invested, for a large portion of the students.

2) By the time my eldest was in Alg 2, in the last half of the book, there were types of problems that would take 10 minutes to solve, even when you knew what you were doing. No surprise to me since I majored in a science--my eldest have two learned that with upper level maths, there is a mastery that comes from working through (wrestling with) problems and thinking through how to solve them on your own. It is different than watching a teacher or a book demonstrate, and thinking, "yeah, that makes sense," and thinking that that mean you "own" the material. In addition, many decent textbooks take you places in the problem sets that teach you more than what is in the lesson. (Larson's Geometry would be a great example.)

Thanks for the opportunity to respond; it helps me clarify my thoughts. :)

[ksva]

Hmmmm .... Ya know, it just occurred to me that had my high school math homework not been graded (and everything else), I never would have put the effort into it that I did. I mean, I think I would have made one stab at it and shoved it aside to go off and do something 'easier' with more immediate rewards. FWIW.

[GVA]

I had a lot of graded homework math homework in high school, almost every night it seemed. The math teachers worked very, very hard IMHO. And I had a lot of graded math in college at a small all-technical school, but there they employed graders. I graded several sections of calculus and one section of number theory for my favorite professor during my last semester there, and I easily worked 15 hours a week because he wanted detailed grading where I showed exactly which step they went wrong on. I even marked his tests and then he worked out how many points they got wrong and figured the final score.

I've been a part-time IT professor at the local CC for ten years now, and I do give online multiple-point tests, but only on terminology and concepts. That part is 30% of their grade, and the rest is on homework and projects. Now we use an online product that actually grades most of the homework, but I still hand-grade the projects. I guess I'm old-fashioned all right.

[Jann in TX]

I taught high school math (way back in the dark ages before I had kids) in an inner-city school (1500 students in 9th and 10 grade). I had 150+ students each day. I taught 6 classes: 4 Algebra 1 and 2 Geometry.

I assigned homework on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays--occasionally on a Friday (when it was NOT football season...).

While I LOVED grading my students' papers--I just did not have TIME to do it every night... Think about it--if I spent just 1 minute grading and recording each paper that would be 2.5 hours! My 'planning' period was spent giving 'tutorials' or having team meetings with other teachers... What worked for me was to have the students grade their papers and THEN hand them in to me. I would scan each paper to see what type of errors the students were making--then I would adjust the beginning of the next day's lesson to review those problem types. I ALWAYS graded the tests. The only multiple choice test I gave was the final--and the students HAD to work out the problems (lots of tricky near-answers).

I did take a homework grade--it was generally 10-20 points or so...I gave a quiz on most Wednesdays that covered Monday and Tuesday's lesson/homework. Our school required a test in all Math classes every 2 weeks... the alternating Fridays I would sometimes give a quiz, sometimes work on projects and sometimes give a lesson with a SMALL amount of homework (usually there was enough class time to finish).

I tried to allow 15 minutes at the end of each class to work on homework--and answer individual questions. When you add in the time spend 'grading' that left 10-15 minutes for the lesson!


I walked around with a briefcase ALL THE TIME--using any 'free' time to grade/scan papers... DH was NOT amused--but he knew that I LOVED doing this!

I only worked full time for 1 year after having our first child--and then I was teaching Jr High Science... When my older girls were school age I once again taught high school Math--but this time at a SMALL private school. It was nice to come home and not have to face 150 papers to grade/scan!

When I work with homeschool students (including my own daughters) I teach for mastery. I insist that all of their homework problems are graded AND corrected before we meet each week. I prefer that the students grade their own papers. I do not assign a grade-- by the time we meet ALL homework should be 100% correct! My interaction with the students during the lesson and the test grades give me a pretty good idea on what final letter grade to assign (if the parents need one). This just is not possible with 20-30 students (most of whom do not care)...

[OC Mom]

She mentioned that, in her experience, homeschooled student sometimes are well-grounded in math, but other times they really lack a decent foundation.

Well, THAT was an absurd statement on her part. I imagine that, in her experience, PUBLIC SCHOOLED students sometimes are well-grounded in math, but other times they really lack a decent foundation, also!

[Valerie(TX)]

Well, THAT was an absurd statement on her part. I imagine that, in her experience, PUBLIC SCHOOLED students sometimes are well-grounded in math, but other times they really lack a decent foundation, also!

thus the irony...:001_rolleyes:

If she hadn't been such a nice lady, we talked about other things as well, I might have pointed that out to her somewhere along the way. I probably should have, but didn't want her to think I was lying in wait to trap her.