> But that's not the same as acknowledging that some people may pick up math more quickly.
Certainly some people are better at things than others - but so what? I know plenty of people that excelled in math in grade school and struggled in high school, also many more that excelled in high school and struggled in college. Some, like myself, struggled in grade school and excelled in high school. The difference was motivation.
> Holding kids back is really the opposite of cultivating mathematical achievement. To use the reading analogy, do you think a kid that can read at 4th grade level should be forced to only read 1st grade books anyway because that's what their age is? I'm not sure what that accomplishes.
And how many brilliant kids moved just a bit too fast and lost interest? The thing is you only view things one way. You forget that a fast ramp-up in difficulty can turn away many students who could've turned out to be brilliant scientists and engineers.
> It'd be one thing to make a resource allocation argument but that's not even what this is. This curriculum is clearly a philosophical statement and personally I don't get it.
I don't agree that it is a philosophical statement, having read it, it seems pretty straightforward. The alarmism about the woke mob is overstated.
As mentioned by OP:
> in chapter one of the earlier draft of the California framework it said, in a prominent place "we reject ideas of natural gifts and talents"
The people that wrote said publicly available draft are still involved with this plan, and have not personally nor explicitly backed down from the statement. It's a good sign that some moderation has been introduced to the text, but it seems clear to me there are still some pretty extreme beliefs amongst those leading this thing.
Whether the "woke alarmism" is over the top or not, I don't think it should be controversial to say that a philosophical statement is at the root of this plan. I wouldn't be surprised if the Equitable Math folks would agree with that assessment even.
I also don't think that criticism of a specific model of leveled courses should be used to dismiss all leveled courses. You talk about kids that are rushed ahead or that perform differently at different points in their math "career" - which could certainly be problematic if levels are rigid throughout the educational timeline and leave little choice to students.
Yes sometimes it is implemented that way. But it is not impossible nor even particularly impractical to implement a more flexible levels system that would mitigate those concerns. There are schools that have done this well, California school system was not one of them. This proposal is throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
I don't see a problem in that statement. The opposite would mean that you are born with ability and can't grow or improve it, which is absolutely false. The idea behind the statement is basically: people do not have to be naturally gifted to be good at math.
> I also don't think that criticism of a specific model of leveled courses should be used to dismiss all leveled courses. You talk about kids that are rushed ahead or that perform differently at different points in their math "career" - which could certainly be problematic if levels are rigid throughout the educational timeline and leave little choice to students.
But arguing for a gifted track IS rigid - it basically says "you must decide now if you're good at math, or not." That is deeply flawed. You can't add flexibility - you need algebra and geometry to do calculus. If you decide or become motivated too late (even if naturally gifted!), you have no recourse, as the "gifted track" starts before you can even know. The current system and system you advocate for could be removing huge numbers of potential STEM graduates from the mix.
> Yes sometimes it is implemented that way. But it is not impossible nor even particularly impractical to implement a more flexible levels system that would mitigate those concerns. There are schools that have done this well, California school system was not one of them. This proposal is throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
Not really - as is said in the framework, most foreign nations that outperform the US have a standard curriculum. So the problem isn't flexibility.
"The framework builds on the strategies used in a number of high-achieving jurisdictions (e.g., Estonia, Finland, Japan, and Korea) that pursue an integrated curriculum—connecting the domains of mathematics with one another as students collaborate in using data to solve real-world problems. These countries pursue a common curriculum in elementary and middle school, supporting more students in reaching higher level mathematics. The framework illustrates how this integrated approach with many different kinds of supports can be used to expand the number of students excelling in mathematics and heading for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers."
If you define "natural talent" in such an unconventional way sure I guess. But the existence of innate potential does not imply that abilities cannot be improved. Derek Jeter has natural talent. Derek Jeter worked his ass off to cultivate those skills. There is nothing at all mutually exclusive about these things.
Schools spend a lot of time reviewing things over the course of the academic year, including things from prior years - I disagree that it is not possible for students to move tracks with a well thought out curriculum plan. But regardless the proposed curriculum eliminates material that would be covered in upper track courses, and explicitly states it does not aim to have students prepared to take calculus during high school. This is like putting all students on the lower track, which is a hell of a solution to the problem of students getting stuck on the lower track.
Japan's model is much more like putting every student in the high track, it is not comparable to what is being proposed here. Japanese high schoolers are able to take intro analysis in 11th grade, here is a translated textbook that would be extremely rare to see a US 11th grader cover the same material (even with standard tracks you'd be lucky to cover it all in 12th):
https://bookstore.ams.org/mawrld-11
I'm not familiar with math education in those other countries mentioned, but I imagine it is more similar to Japan than the US. Hilariously there have been some recent pushes in Japan to be more like the US education system as far as flexibility is concerned, in order to take some of the pressure off of students.
Certainly some people are better at things than others - but so what? I know plenty of people that excelled in math in grade school and struggled in high school, also many more that excelled in high school and struggled in college. Some, like myself, struggled in grade school and excelled in high school. The difference was motivation.
> Holding kids back is really the opposite of cultivating mathematical achievement. To use the reading analogy, do you think a kid that can read at 4th grade level should be forced to only read 1st grade books anyway because that's what their age is? I'm not sure what that accomplishes.
And how many brilliant kids moved just a bit too fast and lost interest? The thing is you only view things one way. You forget that a fast ramp-up in difficulty can turn away many students who could've turned out to be brilliant scientists and engineers.
> It'd be one thing to make a resource allocation argument but that's not even what this is. This curriculum is clearly a philosophical statement and personally I don't get it.
I don't agree that it is a philosophical statement, having read it, it seems pretty straightforward. The alarmism about the woke mob is overstated.