General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Why Would a Math Teacher Punish a Child for Saying 5 x 3 = 15? [View all]EarlG
(22,089 posts)who frequently comes home with math homework that looks nothing like the work that I did when I was in school, I say.... that's fine.
I suck at math. I'm pretty good at mental arithmetic, because I learned math through rote memorization, but even simple algebra is like a foreign language to me. I hated math when I was in school, found it very frustrating, I think partly because I wasn't taught skills that would prepare me for more complex problems.
These teaching strategies are not about fascism or conformity, they're intended to better prepare young kids for the more complicated problems they'll encounter later. Will it work? I don't know, because I'm not an education expert or scientist. But I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.
In this particular case it seems that the expected answer was 3+3+3+3+3 and the kid didn't give the expected answer, so they got it wrong. Not sure what the problem is.