March 15, 1999

Dear Members of the Okemos Board of Education :

I would like to thank the school board and the superintendent’s office for inviting Bill Schmidt to present the TIMSS study. Our nation is lacking math proficient middle school and high school students compared to other countries such as Singapore and Hong Kong. My main criticism about the math programs in Okemos School has always been the CMP textbooks adopted by the middle schools and the TERC investigations with no textbooks in the elementary schools. In Hong Kong, Singapore and all the other leading countries in the TIMSS study, well organized textbooks are provided to students. Why does Okemos School district abandon math textbooks for the elementary grades? If the TERC investigations program is effective, why does Edgewood elementary school, the first school which fully embraced the new program, have to supplement the fourth grade math with packages of materials to prepare students to take Michigan Educational Assessment Program (MEAP tests) -- Such packages were not needed just a couple years ago when my daughters attended Edgewood Elementary Schools.

In the middle school, Algebra, one of the most important skills an eighth grader should learn is now being taught as an exploratory class. Instead of a well balanced blended program advocated by the board last year, both the seventh and eighth graders in Kinawa have had CMP math since November. If students in Hong Kong and Singapore achieve high math scores by using textbooks which are organized and structured, Why are we using these CMP booklets which have no resemblence to the textbooks used by middle schoolers in all other other countries with leading math scores in the TIMSS study?

I am sure that the board adopted the Connected Math Project believing that the program will connect math to everyday life experience, will promote math understanding in students and will show students how math is used in real life application. Unfortunately, as I have mentioned in my previous addresses to the board, our children spend a lot of time learning irrelevant math trivias such as perfect numbers and “rep-tiles”. Their homework assignments consist of many irrelevant word problems such as describing graphs of unhappiness and hunger. While most parents share the concerns that students should learn to solve word problems, not just crunching numbers, but, in practice, the CMP provides some of the worst word problems in the pretence of doing “real life problems”. In a recent 7th grade homework assignment, students were asked to do several problems similar to the following one: (Pg. 29, "Moving Straight Ahead".)

The 1996 Olympic gold medal winner for the 20-kilometer walk was Jefferson Perez from Ecuador. His time was 1 hour, 20 minutes, 7 seconds. Perez's time was not good enough to beat the Olympic record set in 1988 by Josef Pribilinec from Czechoslovakia. Pribilinec's record for the 20-kilometer was 1 hour, 19 minutes, 57 seconds. What was the walking rate of each person.

My daughter dutifully punched the numbers into her calculator and wrote down the answers as :

Jefferson Perez : 0.00416 km/s
Josef Pribilinec : 0.00417 km/s

When I asked my daughter what she supposed to learn from the exercise, she looked at me with a blank expression. When I asked her why she chose the unit of km/s instead of meter per second or meter per hour, she gave me the standard CMP reply that her teacher said there is no absolute correct answer in math homework. The book asked for rate, so she calculated a rate. She then continued to do similar problems that evening by punching more numbers into her calculator. No new light was shed the next morning when her teacher graded her homework.

If the problem meant that the student should calculate speed in certain units, it should have said so clearly instead of using a fuzzy term “rate”. Most 7th graders have pretty good concept of speed. (Just ask any parent who has been caught speeding by their child who reads the speed limit signs.) However 0.00416 km/s means nothing to most 7th graders and even some parents. They cannot relate that to their daily experience. If the problem meant to compare the rate of winners, the original description of how long it took a winner to walk 20-kilometer is the most sensible description. Can you imagine a sportcaster anouncing that the winner Jefferson Perez’s walking rate was 0.00416 km/s as compared to the Olympic record of 0.00417 km/s achieved by Josef Pribilinec?

Such word problems which convey no context in real life only train low-skilled employees who cannot function without cash registers. Unfortunately these types of problems proliferate throughout the CMP booklets. In Okemos, 90% of our children go to college, let’s provide them with a world-class education to prepare them with math skills and understanding to compete globally in the next century. CMP has no place in this type of education.

Sincerely yours

Betty Tsang

 Last year, the board ordered the implementation of option programs for some students. According to Lee Gerard, both the sixth graders and seventh graders who skipped one year of CMP, including those who did not pass the initial tests are doing well in the higher grade math. This Okemos experience actually testifies to the fact that CMP is a watered down curriculum and skipping one grade is not a major problem. On the other hand, some 8th graders who were recommended to take High School Geometry Honors class this year are struggling due to the lack of solid background in Algebra I. Only a year ago, eighth graders were able to choose Algebra I Honors for math. Unfortunately, starting this school year, Algebra I was replaced by Eighth Grade Honors Math. This class attempts to include all 8 units of CMP plus some traditional Algebra I curriculum. Since time is not unlimited, some materials have to be dropped. Thus students are learning exponential functions which is traditionally not studied in depth until Algebra II at the expense of building a solid foundation in Algebra I. I have no objections to expose students, especially high ability ones to advanced materials. Unfortunately, what we are doing here is like decorating a second floor bedroom before the first floor foundation is laid. An contractor who practices such illogical way of building will be fired. It is rather strange that the board will allow such illogical way of teaching our children.

Algebra I is the stepping stone to higher math classes in high school. According to the Okemos High School “Guide to curriculum for students and parents”, Algebra I is required before taking Geometry and Algebra II. Some parents whose children are in the 8th grade honors class are already concerned if their children will be prepared to take Algebra II. Thus I urge the board to do an in depth study to see if the current eighth grade honor class will equip our children with the necessary skills so that they can continue on with Algebra II. I also urge the board to authorize the option of allowing high ability middle school students to take Algebra I Honors in high school as this class is not being taught in the middle school.