Georgia, the latest battlefront in the national math war, could soon join the ranks of states offering both traditional and integrated teaching approaches.
After thousands of failing test scores and three years of complaints about integrated math — a complex mix of algebra, geometry and statistics — the state’s top educator wants systems to choose how students will learn math. Beginning this fall, systems might be able to return to traditional math instruction, stick with the integrated math, or offer both styles.
On Monday, the state Board of Education will vote on whether to offer a new menu of math classes for rising freshmen. These would include the familiar choices of algebra I, geometry and algebra II. The traditional math classes would be more rigorous than those offered before integrated math began in the fall of 2008, to align with the state’s tougher performance standards.
Offering a choice is the truce many states have embraced in the past decade to end political attacks waged by parents and teachers who have taken to the Internet and packed board meetings in protest of integrated math. Some parents say the well-intentioned national math movement, which gained popularity in the early 90s, pushes kids to tackle problems that may be too complex.
“It all sounds great until you start comparing it with what students used to be able to do,” said Tammy Lucas, co-founder of Georgia Parents for Math, an Internet-based activist group. “Algebra and geometry is not so overly complex that we should have so many students in need of extra help that they would have to spend an hour a day after school in a support class.”
Proponents say an integrated approach allows students to see how math concepts connect to solve problems. Students, they say, can live up to higher expectations if given more time. Still, 80,000 high school test takers statewide — 41 percent — failed math I and math II exams last May.
Those who favor integrated math characterize the failures as growing pains that will someday make Georgia’s students more competitive globally.
“Close to 90 percent of the countries in the world teach math in an integrated way,” said J. Michael Shaughnessy, president of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. “We are about the only country in the world that still teaches a layer cake math. We constantly have been compared to other countries on international tests. Most of the time, the U.S. comes up in the middle of the pack or below the middle.”
Shaughnessy hopes the state board of education won’t cave to politics like other states.
New York City Schools ditched integrated math. California faced similar push-back and decided to leave the math decision up to school districts and parents who know their kids. So did North Carolina.
But not Georgia. Until now.
State Superintendent John Barge wants local districts to decide. In Georgia, 6,000 to 10,000 teens are in jeopardy of not graduating because they can’t pass required math courses. If the state school board approves the new math courses, districts can teach math sequentially, stick with integrated or offer a combination of both.
State board member Larry Winter, who favors choice, said he’s had people stop him on the street to weigh in on the math debate. “Different students and different teachers learn and teach more effectively in different ways,” he said.
In California, the traditional approach to math is the overwhelming favorite of the college bound. Integrated math I is taught to 8,224 students. Nearly 700,000 teens take algebra I.
Utah, on the other hand, followed Georgia in mandating integrated math. Its push, starting next fall, will be rolled out slowly, starting with middle school so high school teachers can get a year of training to deliver the program. Georgia was criticized for forcing accelerated math on its teachers too quickly.
Choice in Georgia won’t stop the challenges facing the Class of 2012, the first to graduate under Georgia Performance Standards.
Wheeler High parent Louise Klein said she is growing weary of seeing her 17-year-old be a guinea pig. Klein said she spends 10 to 15 hours weekly helping her with homework. “She hasn’t gotten a 90 in math since this new curriculum started. She gets frustrated doing lessons she doesn’t understand and will start crying. This math is a constant battle.”
In the three school years integrated math has been in Georgia high schools, local tutors have done a brisk business.
Melanie Staus, co-owner of Mathnasium of West Roswell, which sees 55 to 75 students a day, said parents of high school students arrive in “panic mode.”
“It is very difficult to be in a class where you are taking notes, you are trying to do the homework and you get a quiz or a test and you bomb — fail with a 40 or 50 percent,” Staus said.
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