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From: roberta@eleazar.Dartmouth.EDU (Roberta Millstein)
Newsgroups: comp.ai,comp.edu,comp.cog-eng
Subject: Re: Becoming CAI literate
Message-ID: <8194@eleazar.Dartmouth.EDU>
Date: 18 Feb 88 22:43:58 GMT
References: <26@dogie.edu> <3340@killer.UUCP>
Reply-To: roberta@eleazar.Dartmouth.EDU (Roberta Millstein)
Organization: Dartmouth College, Hangover,NH
Lines: 25


>> In article <3316@killer.UUCP> elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) writes:

>Spending hours and hours improving your speed of computing numbers was
>worthwhile before the advent of $5 calculators. But I would much rather that
>our school children be taught MATHEMATICS for those multitude of hours. Sure,
>teach them computation skills. But don't make mere arithmetic computation the
>only thing taught to our students, like it is today (at least in this state...
>from grades 1 through 6, adding, subtraction, multiplication, and division,
>day after day... blech!). Is it any wonder that the majority of the students
>in the local "gifted and talented" program despise "math" class, calling it
>boring and repetitive?


I was in one of those "gifted and talented" programs at that age and I too
thought math class was boring and repetitive...that was because generally more
drill was involved in regular classes than was necessary.  That's why they
*have* gifted and talented programs, to provide a more stimulating learning
environment.  However, that doesn't mean that some good drilling in arithmetic
wasn't useful--I am a firm believer that a having a good strong base in things
like mathematics makes all the difference when you have to conquer more
complicated concepts, like algebra, calculus, etc.  The fact that the students
were bored was a function of the fact that they were in a program that was
too easy for them, not that the drills were useless.  For those that need
the hours of drill to become proficient, however, they are very worthwhile.