Fuzzy Math

Okay, this should disturb everyone in America, particularly those with children in school!

Michelle Malkin blows open the so-called 'fuzzy math' scandal (at least, it should be a scandal) around the Everyday Math curriculum currently being used in schools around the country.

This curriculum is marketed as a University of Chicago program, but the fine print shows it's the department of education -- not mathematics -- that created it. So, what's wrong with it?

[Y]ou start to sense something’s not adding up when your kid starts second grade and comes home with the same kindergarten-level addition and subtraction problems — for the second year in a row.

And then your child keeps telling you that the teacher isn’t really teaching anything, just handing out useless worksheets — some of which make no sense to parents with business degrees, medical degrees, and Ph.D.s specializing in econometric analysis. And then you notice that it’s the University of Chicago education department, not the mathematics department, that is behind this nonsense.

And then you Google Everyday Math and discover that countless moms and dads just like you — and a few brave teachers with their heads screwed on straight — have had similarly horrifying experiences. Like the Illinois mom who found these “math” problems in the fifth-grade Everyday Math textbook:

A. If math were a color, it would be ___, because ___.
B. If it were a food, it would be ___, because ___.
C. If it were weather, it would be ___, because ___.

And then you realize your child has become a victim of “Fuzzy Math,” the “New New Math,” the dumbed-down, politically correct, euphemism-filled edu-folly corrupting both public and private schools nationwide.

Sadly, some school districts (New York, for example) continue to support and use this curriculum despite huge opposition from both parents and teachers. The good news is that other school districts (Texas, for example) have renounced the worthless program. Fortunately, Texas is a trend-setter in educational circles, so hopefully more states will follow.

What is your child's math curriculum? You might want to find out.

There's my two cents.