Let them do Maths

[Nearly Sane]

Simplistic, badly thought out sound bite politics.


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64158179

[ProfessorDavey]

Simplistic, badly thought out sound bite politics.


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-64158179

I agree that it is ill thought through, not least because schools are struggling to have enough qualified maths teachers already.

But at a fundamental level I think education in England and Wales (less so of course in Scotland) requires students to narrow their learning and therefore their options too early. Broadening 16-18 curriculum isn't a bad idea to me and were this to allow students to attain greater abilities in the core subjects so much the better. However this would require much wider reforms than the headline suggests, not least at university where students would likely arrive with less depth in the subject they are choosing to study, but greater breadth - that would likely require longer degree programmes - hmm not likely to go down well when current debt levels are huge.

[jeremyp]

Simplistic, badly thought out sound bite politics.

This looks like a simplistic badly thought out sound bite.

It's simplistic because it just makes an assertion without any justification. Why is Sunak's announcement simplistic and badly thought out?

It's badly though out because it didn't occur to you that it was an example of that which it denigrates and that somebody like me would read it and be impressed and entertained by its self referential nature.

[jeremyp]

As far as the policy is concerned, I would want to know exactly what they are planning to teach. For the people who are not planning on going into STEM careers, a lot of the maths taught at that sort of level is completely useless. Furthermore, many people struggle with advanced level mathematics: unless there is a specific goal in mind, it seems pointless to torture them in their last years of education.

What I would like to see is concentration on ideas of numeracy. Give people the tools they need to understand when advocates are bullshitting them with maths and statistics.

[Nearly Sane]

This looks like a simplistic badly thought out sound bite.

It's simplistic because it just makes an assertion without any justification. Why is Sunak's announcement simplistic and badly thought out?

It's badly though out because it didn't occur to you that it was an example of that which it denigrates and that somebody like me would read it and be impressed and entertained by its self referential nature.

Oddly enough it did occur to me but I credited people with the ability to understand the difference between something announced by the PM and a comment on a messageboard by someone who is posting under a pseudonym. Sadly it would appear I was wrong.

[jeremyp]

Oddly enough it did occur to me but I credited people with the ability to understand the difference between something announced by the PM and a comment on a messageboard by someone who is posting under a pseudonym. Sadly it would appear I was wrong.

What evidence have you got that I don't understand the difference between you and the PM? Isn't it more plausible that I just picked up on the irony of criticising the PM for something by dong the exact same thing?

Anyway, I also posted a serious response to your OP.

[Nearly Sane]

What evidence have you got that I don't understand the difference between you and the PM? Isn't it more plausible that I just picked up on the irony of criticising the PM for something by dong the exact same thing?

Anyway, I also posted a serious response to your OP.

Context matters. You seem not to understand that

As to the serious posts by you and Prof D. I mainly agree but when we have an announcement by the PM like this it would appear to be vastly unlikely.


I think in addition to the points made, the whole area of tertiary education needs reorganised. The drive to increase numbers attending has never seemed evidence based. It feels like a very old fashioned solution, and Covid probably gave a small window where a major reorganisation could have been triggered.


Given that there is a lot of evidence collated across the world on education, we really should be using it to see what's working. Education should be seen as one of the top, if not the top appt in the cabinet.

[Udayana]

There are already plenty of opportunities for people to study maths beyond the GCSE level - the problem is that students don't want to as they have not understood how the maths that they have already been taught can be used effectively.

[Nearly Sane]

Nothing I did at Maths past 16 taught me to think of this, and yet.. 


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem