Slow Teaching Blamed for Lag in Math Skills
A government-sponsored study concluded Tuesday that American students are doing poorly in math, and experts laid some of the blame on the redundant, slow-paced way it is taught in most schools.
The National Assessment of Educational Progress reported that almost half of the 17-year-old students tested in 1985-86 proved incapable of handling math commonly taught in junior high school, and nearly 27% of 13-year-olds were stumped by basic computations.
“Our ninth graders are taking what other peoples’ seventh graders are taking,” Chester Finn Jr., the assistant U.S. secretary of education for research and improvement, said at a news conference. “We’ve got to get it going faster, repeated less and make sure that it’s learned more.”
The study was based on exams given to nearly 15,000 students ages 9, 13 and 17 in 1985-86, and to nearly 35,000 students in grades 3, 7 and 11. It showed that all three age groups had made modest improvements.
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