Quartz – Laura Overdeck
“College-educated people aren’t afraid to read. When they open a newspaper article or blog post, they assume they’ll be able to read it. That’s because the content is written at roughly the ninth grade reading level. But do we all feel just as solid on ninth grade math? Clearly not, as restaurants now calculate the tip for customers—a task that requires only fifth grade math skills. Americans are afraid to divide by five. Our country bemoans its weakness in math on two levels. On the macro level, our students are regularly trounced by other countries on international tests. On the individual level, kids and adults alike get nervous about math and even despise it, making these test outcomes not all that surprising. As we collectively fret over curricula and lurch from one solution to another, we ignore a much larger piece of the puzzle: our sharp double standard in how we present reading vs. math to our kids. In launching the nonprofit Bedtime Math and navigating the world of early math, I’ve been stunned to discover how our society relentlessly stokes math anxiety—and often from birth.”(more)