Stepping off a polygon

[mklotz]

"Stepping off would be faster..." Any student with grade 11 math should have no trouble applying the cosine law to a simple diagram - which anyone should have no trouble sketching...not much understanding required.

I'm inclined to agree with you.

Nevertheless, most posts involving anything remotely mathematical beyond the four functions will have posters with little on-topic to offer advertising, as if proud of it, their ignorance of mathematics.

How is it that the educational system(s) have failed so miserably to instill an understanding of elementary math below the calculus level?

Everyone will have his own answer to that question so I'll offer my own thoughts on the subject to get the ball rolling.

From my own experience, teachers fail to answer what the first slide in any presentation should be: Why do you want to learn this? Admittedly, in math it's difficult to answer if the student doesn't yet know how to use what's being introduced but, by re-answering the question as each bit of new knowledge is presented, some degree of communication can be effected.

Still, the student has to apply himself and learn. I think a large part of that problem stems from the fact that math is the first time he is faced with a subject that is absolute, offering no opportunity for interpretation. You can argue endlessly about what the author of Catcher in the Rye meant or what the impact of the North's victory at Vicksburg was on the Civil War but the solution to a polynomial equation provides no opportunity for self-expression. Students denied the opportunity to manipulate the subject react by mentally retreating from it. (OTH, they could just be typically lazy kids who don't want to learn anything. :-)

Finally, a society that denigrates intellectual achievement makes it difficult, bordering on anti-social, to demonstrate learning. Sports achievement outweighs any learning that might be useful in the world most students will enter.