Mathematics achievement in America is far below what we would like it to be. Recent "reform" efforts only aggravate the problem. As a result, our children have less and less exposure to rigorous, content-rich mathematics .

The advocates of the new, fuzzy math have practiced their rhetoric well. They speak of higher-order thinking, conceptual understanding and solving problems, but they neglect the systematic mastery of the fundamental building blocks necessary for success in any of these areas. Their focus is on things like calculators, blocks, guesswork, and group activities and they shun things like algorithms and repeated practice. The new programs are shy on fundamentals and they also lack the mathematical depth and rigor that promotes greater achievement.

Concerned parents are in a state of dismay and have begun efforts to restore content, rigor, and genuinely high expectations to mathematics education. This site provides relevant background and information for parents, teachers, board members and the public from around the country.

New York City HOLD National Honest Open Logical Decisions on Mathematics Education Reform

A national nonpartisan advocacy organization that provides parents, K-12 educators, mathematicians and scientists, and others information resources and networking opportunities to support systemic improvements in the quality of mathematics education in our nation's schools.

The performance of American students in mathematics is mediocre at best. Reform efforts over the past two decades have only made matters worse. We are advocates for school mathematics education reforms that support the mathematics interests and abilities of all students. We advocate programs and policies that help all students achieve success in school mathematics courses, that prepare all students for the broadest options in high school math and science courses, and that give them the opportunity to advance into mathematics based college courses and careers.

NYC HOLD National (Honest Open Logical Decisions on Mathematics Education Reform) is a nonpartisan advocacy organization that provides parents, K-12 educators, mathematicians, scientists and other concerned citizens information, resources and networking opportunities to support systemic improvements in the quality of mathematics education in our nation's schools. NYC HOLD was first established in order to address mathematics education in the New York City schools. It is now a national organization

A quarter century of US 'maths wars' and political partisanship by David Klein

... One of the advocates for California approved textbooks was Barry Simon, the mathematics chair and IBM Professor of Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at the California Institute of Technology. Simon asserted that basic skills are essential to mathematics and counselled against redefining algebra via the NCTM aligned programmes in order to increase passage rates. Confronting the social justice arguments of the progressivists, he countered, 'If anyone is racist or sexist, it is those who claim that women and minorities are unable to deal with traditional mathematics'...

An Open Letter in Support of California's Standards System for K-12 Education

In an open letter dated July 7, 2006, former governors Gray Davis and Pete Wilson expressed unambiguous support for California's K-12 academic content standards, curriculum frameworks, instructional materials, and tests aligned to the standards. They warned that dismantling California's system for K-12 education would be a disastrous step backward.

Save Our Children from Mediocre Math

Save Our Children from Mediocre Math (SOCMM) is a non partisan organization that advocates ensuring Conejo Valley Unified School District parents have a choice to have students instructed in mathematics using a State Board of Education approved curriculum.

Kids Do Count!

Great Connected Math News! We know of two Alpine Jr. High Schools that have completely thrown out Connected Mathematics (excepting one teacher) because it failed so badly!

Rebuttal to Johnny Lott's "Stalkers"

Johnny Lott's condemnation of the open letter as a form of "stalking" appears to be an attempt to side step legitimate criticisms of the current direction of mathematics education in the United States.

California's Algebra Crisis

California has had its share of educational crises—such as whole language and fuzzy math. Despite recent improvements, the state is still in the grips of an algebra crisis.

Review of the Interactive Mathematics Program (requires Adobe Reader)

IMP is a program designed to retain the attention of students who will either not attend college or will major in non math fields. It lacks the depth of study for students who will study math in college. It is not a college prep math curriculum.

NYC HOLD (Honest Open Logical Debate on Mathematics Education Reform) Web Site

NYC HOLD is a nonpartisan advocacy organization that provides parents, educators, mathematicians and other concerned citizens opportunities to work together to improve the quality of mathematics education in the New York City schools.
We have followed our children's experience and progress in NCTM Standards-based mathematics programs and have grown increasingly concerned. We have studied the materials and teaching approaches in our children's schools. Some of us have researched the programs and their use in other regions and found that we are not alone in our concerns, rather, our experiences and worries are shared by parents across the country.

We have been dismayed and frustrated by teachers' reports that their hands are tied, that they're not free to teach with the materials and methods they believe best suited for our children. We have learned that mathematicians and scientists have confirmed our suspicions that the programs lack adequate skills development, important topics, and the rigor necessary to prepare our children for advanced high school math and science courses and pursuit of college math-based courses and majors.

Is Los Angeles dictating bad use of a good math book?

Is LA turning a silk purse into a sow's ear? An Open Letter to the superintendent and school Board suggests LA's Algebra I pacing plan is disastrous and undermines both the California math standards and state approved textbooks.

A Plan for Improving the Quality of Exposition in High School Mathematics by Frank B. Allen

In order to raise the level of student achievement in secondary school mathematics, which everyone agrees is urgently necessary, there must be major improvements in the expository procedures employed by teachers.

How the NCEE Redefines K-12 Math: An Analysis of the NCEE Math Performance Standards by Bill Quirk

The NCEE is satisfied with entry level math. Their "vision" is limited to the needs of everyday life. The concept of prerequisite knowledge is never mentioned. They're not concerned with setting the stage for learning more advanced math. Many of their high school math examples belong at the elementary school level. They claim to emphasize conceptual understanding, but give no evidence that they understand how math ideas are connected. They appear blind to the vertically-structured nature of the math knowledge domain.

Gambling Math

Math based approach of finding the best uk online casinos by Liam Doyle

Mathematics Education in California

• The California Mathematics Standards
• Mathematics Framework for California Public Schools: Kindergarten through Grade Twelve [requires Adobe Acrobat reader]
• Practice Problems for the California Mathematics Standards Grades 1-8 [requires Adobe Acrobat reader]
• More about California

A review of Geometry: tools for a changing world

David E. Joyce provides this review of the Prentice-Hall Geometry text, noting ... It's the content that bothers me, in particular, the lack of logical content. The review covers each chapter in a way that is especially informative for those required to use this text.

Does Two Plus Two Still Equal Four? What Should Our Children Know about Math?

Despite efforts to improve mathematics education in the United States, the August 2001 National Assessment of Educational Progress report found that a majority of children are still unable to perform at a basic level in mathematics and that an achievement gap between white and minority students continues to persist in that subject. The link provides information and transcript of the seminar at AEI.

Stand and Deliver Revisited by Jerry Jesness

The untold story behind the famous rise -- and shameful fall -- of Jaime Escalante, America’s master math teacher.

TERC Hands-On Math: A Snapshot View by Bill Quirk

A review of the TERC (Investigations in Number, Data, and Space) mathematics program shows:
• TERC Omits All Standard Computational Methods
• TERC Omits Standard Formulas
• TERC Omits Standard Terminology

Also read the full report, TERC Hands-On Math: The Truth is in the Details.

A Brief History of American K-12 Mathematics Education in the 20th Century by David Klein

Mathematics education policies and programs for U.S. public schools have never been more contentious than they were during the decade of the 1990s. The immediate cause of the math wars of the 90s was the introduction and widespread distribution of new math textbooks with radically diminished content, and a dearth of basic skills. This led to organized parental rebellions and criticisms of the new math curricula by mathematicians and other professionals.

In NYC, organized parent and teacher opposition to the new math programs began in District 2, one of the city's best; and now extends to District 3, District 10 and District 15. Bronx high school teachers have organized to express opposition to next years' requirement they use only the Interactive Mathematics Project (IMP), an experimental high school math program. The teachers worry the program lacks important mathematical content necessary to prepare large numbers of their students for the Regents A exam and college level coursework.
The new programs, many without student texts, are based on a "constructivist" teaching philosophy, which discourages teachers from teaching mathematical rules and procedures. Instead, teachers guide students, through group activities, to their own "discovery" of personal solutions. Students are encouraged to seek help from each other, rather than from the teacher.

A point by point review of CPM Mathematics vis-a-vis the California Standards. Much of Volume 1 actually detracts from developing algebraic competence. Almost all of the mathematical content is at the level of the Grade 7 standards or below ... This is not algebra and it is not college preparatory math, no matter what it calls itself. Eventually, Volume 2 starts teaching some algebra but it is too little and too late.

The list of K-8 programs approved by the State Board of Education on January 10, 2001. These programs were seen as the best fit to the state Mathematics Standards [.pdf file 504k] and the guidelines in the Mathematics Framework [.pdf file 1748k].

This site provides reviews of textbooks adoped in California for middle school, including texts in algebra 1. The report helps to identify the strengths and weaknesses of these adopted programs.

This is the press release for the report from Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy. The full text [.pdf file 741k] of the report, Facing the Classroom Challenge Teacher Quality and Teacher Training in California’s Schools of Education is also available.

What do you say? How do you respond when your school tells you that your child's math program is going to be replaced? What is your reaction when the replacements main advantages are a "Tokyo by Night" layout, fuzzy-headed but politically correct examples, oddball algorithms and methods (or no methods at all), and a big emphasis on writing essays and playing games?

My disagreement with my father contained the essential elements of the current Math Wars, the debate that is going on today over the way that mathematics should be taught.

Ralph A. Raimi, professor emeritus of mathematics at the University of Rochester, talks about MSPAP, the examination system Maryland uses to assess student performance. He notes that, The system was of no value for its announced purpose. For the full story see the Washington Times of Sunday, April 1, 2001.

Opposition to California's mathematics standards from reform leaders continues as of this writing. Former NCTM president Jack Price wrote in a letter published by the Los Angeles Times on May 10, 1998:


...if the state board had adopted world-class mathematics standards for the 21st century instead of the 19th century, there would have been a great deal of support from the 'education' community.

This sententious observation encapsulates the topics discussed in this essay. For the reformers, "world-class mathematics standards for the 21st century" eluded the Stanford mathematicians who wrote California's 1998 math standards. Missing are the greater emphasis on technology--an end in itself--and pedagogical directives harmonious with the reified "cognitive styles" of the racially diverse populations of the 21st century. The "19th century" arithmetic, algebra, geometry, and trigonometry highlighted in California's 1998 standards will have diminished value in the postmodern epoch of technological wonderments envisioned by math reformers. Perhaps the academic community should consider whether the discipline of mathematics education--much more so than mathematics--needs fundamental alterations for the 21st century.

NCTM Math in the NCEE America's Choice Performance Standards

• The NCEE Wants to Demonstrate "How Good is Good Enough"
• What's Emphasized in the ACPS? What's Missing?
• A Compact Version of the 38 ACPS Math Examples

2+2=5: Fuzzy Math Invades Wisconsin Schools, [.pdf file 80k] by Leah Vukmir

This level of parental outrage and concern is certainly not confined to McFarland. According to Parents Raising Educational Standards in Schools, a Wisconsin-based parent organization, math education has become the number one concern of parents calling for information and assistance. In the last two years it has supplanted the "Reading Wars" and is causing parents across Wisconsin and the nation to organize and rebel.

Standards in School Mathematics [.pdf file, 52k, see second page]

Ralph Raimi discusses the new Principles and Standards for School Mathematics (PSSMP) from the NCTM.

I warn you that these "principles and standards" cannot be appreciated by reading only a few pages. In the small the document sometimes sounds good. But if PSSM in the large informs our vision, then self-esteem is better than knowledge, dictionaries can replace a ready (memorized?) vocabular, and higher-order thinking skills will boil stones into soup.

Cognitive Child Abuse in Our Math Classrooms, By C. Bradley Thompson

Whole math must lead to a miasma of confusion, boredom, and despair. Rather than encouraging independent, conceptual-level thinking, it is thoroughly anti-conceptual. It dooms children to function on a primitive, perceptual level—i.e., to flounder in a chaotic sea of concretes with no objective principles to guide them. This is cognitive child abuse. Whole-math defenders are shrinking the cognitive capacities of their students to those of infants or even animals.

Romancing the Child by E. D. HIRSCH JR.

"The progressive way of running a school is essentially the opposite of what the 'effective schools' research has taught us." So says Hirsch in the new journal, Education Next

Open Letter on the Department of Education's List of Programs

The U.S. Department of Education issued a statement endorsing some of the worst mathematics programs available. This prompted a rebuttal endorsed by over 200 of the nation's leading mathematicians and has resulted in a congressional hearing.

Testimony to the House of Representatives regarding the Department of Education

Testimony from the appropriations subcommittee that deals with the Department of Education.

Reality Check 2001

Although high-stakes standardized tests are often controversial, Reality Check picks up few signs of public backlash. Neither parents, teachers, nor students themselves voice significant dissatisfaction with testing in their own schools. Large majorities of all groups express strong support for their own district's efforts to raise standards and for using standardized tests to enforce standards ...

Clinton's Proposed National Voluntary Mathematics Test

Noting the inadequate achievement in school mathematics in the United States, President Clinton proposed a voluntary national test as a way to combat the problem. Examinations can be an effective way to stimulate achievement gains, but the devil is in the details. Clinton's plan got off to a bad start. The first committee working on it was full of fuzzy math supporters, and the initial plans were dismal. The test design was shifted from the initial committee to the National Assessment Governing Board. The progress was often delayed and funding was restricted by congress.

The Truth About The REVISED NCTM Standards: Arithmetic is Still Missing! by William G. Quirk, Ph.D.

Similar to the original NCTM Standards, PSSM is vague about the major components of arithmetic mastery:
1.Memorization of of basic number facts
2.Mastery of the standard algorithms of arithmetic
3.Mastery of fractions


The NCTM has toned down the constructivist language, but they still stress content-independent "process skills" and student-centered "discovery learning". Similar to the NCTM Standards, PSSM emphasizes manipulatives, calculator skills, student-invented methods, and simple-case methods.

Mathematics "Council" Loses Hard-Earned Credibiility

By Frank B. Allen

The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, now led by theoreticians from our Schools of Education, imposes policies that distort the teaching process and heavily impair the learning of school mathematics. Can the NCTM accept the challenge to Save Our Schools?.

Brown Center Report on American Education [.pdf file 43k]

The academic achievement of American students has risen since the 1970s but only at a snail’s pace. Performance in arithmetic remained static or declined slightly. Results for thirteen year olds suggest large numbers of students have not mastered the basic arithmetic skills that are necessary before moving on to algebra.

High Achievement in Mathematics: Lessons from Three Los Angeles Elementary Schools

In a paper commissioned by the Brookings Institution, David Klein describes characteristics and academic policies of three low income elementary schools in the Los Angeles area whose students are unusually successful in mathematics.

Excerpts from Math Wars

The Wall Street Journal Editiorial of January 4, 2000 addressed the so-called reform in mathematics education. The editorial concludes that New Math will take its casualties, especially among the poor, adding to the already mounting costs of the decline in national educational standards.

Why Education Experts Resist Effective Practices, by Douglas Carnine

American education is under intense pressure to produce better results. The increasing importance of education to the economic well-being of individuals and nations will continue feeding this pressure. In the past—and still today—the profession has tended to respond to such pressures by offering untested but appealing nostrums and innovations that do not improve academic achievement.

Basic Skills Versus Conceptual Understanding: A Bogus Dichotomy in Mathematics Education [.pdf file 54k], by H. Wu

The truth is that in mathematics, skills and understanding are completely intertwined. In most cases, the precision and fluency in the execution of the skills are the requisite vehicles to convey the conceptual understanding.

Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics [.pdf file 73k], by Richard Askey

The U.S. Department of Education has announced the results of an exercise to identify "expemplary" and "promising" texts. Connected Mathemaitcs, a series for grades 6-8, is one the department has deemed exemplary. I do not understand why it deserves that rating. I am quite familiar with this series, as I reviewed it as part of a textbook adoption process. Regarding fractions, for example, Connected Math has some material on the addition and subtraction of fractions, but nothing as systematic as described by the Chinese teachers interviewed by Ma. There is less on multiplication of fractions, and nothing on the division of fractions. If our students go through grade 8 without having studied the division of fractions, where are our future primary teachers going to learn this? The criteria used by the Department of Education review should be rewritten now that Liping Ma's book has provided us with a model of what school mathematics should look like.

Reform Mathematics Education: How to "Succeed" Without Really Trying

The reform designs open the door to claims of successfully teaching mathematics without really doing so. The reform writings and methods are many and varied, but a common feature is that they end up obscuring the failure to teach mathematics. In reform mathematics education, the goal of success for all is not supported by achievement but rather by redefining success and, mostly, by obscuring failure.

Recent Directions in San Diego Mathematics Education

It is obvious that the district is planning to used dumbed-down mathematics in the focus schools. They are taking the approach we have fought so hard to avoid - lowing expectations while claiming otherwise.

San Diego Draft Framework Critique

Is San Diego trying to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory? After the release of state and district standards and a state framework that all align to set high expectations for student learning and clearly detail the course of mathematics instruction, San Diego has released a draft of a local framework that seems devoid of substance. See this review for more details.

New-New Math in Santa Monica

The curriculum problems in Santa Monica are complicated by an insidious form of discrimination where students in the more affluent neighborhood schools have the benefit of a State approved, State content aligned curriculum and the schools in less affluent southern part of the District have MathLand and CPM, neither of which is State approved for educational content ... With nearly one-sixth of the students in our elementary and middle schools in danger of retention at the end of June, 2000, giving parents complete and truthful information was an important step in helping children succeed. We formed a coalition of parents and other interested parties to address the issues at the District level, Santa Monicans Working for Equity and Excellence in Public Schools (SMWEEPS).

Mountain View Achievement

Mountain View Achievement is a group of concerned parents, teachers and community volunteers who believe that all children can achieve academic success when given appropriate opportunities and tools. We are dedicated to improving educational opportunities, and we invite every member of the community to join us in this endeavor.

Russian Mathematics

From Mathematics: A Text for 6th Graders
by Enn R. Nurk and Aksel E. Telgmaa
© 1995 Drofa, Moscow
Translated from the Russian by Willis Harte
University of Iowa College of Education

The Role of Long Division in the K-12 Curriculum

Reviews the reasons that most math educators today depreciate the topic and other topics in the curriculum that derive from it, methods for teaching long division in such a way that the underlying concepts can be understood by students, the ways in which these concepts develop in later mathematics course, and why they are so important.

Number Sense in California

By showing topic development across grade levels, it becomes easier to evaluate any particular piece of mathematics content relative to the California standards. The California grade level of content from textbooks or tests or other sets of mathematics standards can thus be more easily identified.

NYC MATH WARS

Community response in NYC and across the country has erupted in what have become known as the "math wars." Critical parents, joined by mathematicians and scientists advocate clarity and balance in math reform: urging the inclusion of grade by grade goals, explicit teaching of standard procedures, basic skill building and rigor along with the inclusion of some of the creative exercises in the new programs. The pendulum has swung too far and must be corrected.

The Mathematics Framework in Massachusetts

Massachusetts has been going through quite a struggle over arithmetic in their state mathematics framework. Links include background and the details of the story of the attack by Hyman Bass on the Massachusetts Deputy Commissioner of Education.

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