I agree with all of this, and I don't think we had talked about it!
if I could redesign the curriculum I would not require non-technically-oriented students to take advanced algebra/trig/etc. Nothing over, probably, Algebra I or so (and I'm not even totally sure about that)
YES PLEASE. I would keep enough algebra to teach at least the concepts of solving for a variable and when you might need to know it, and how to learn it, and then...most of the details can be left to the person to decide when they need to know it.
AND everyone should take statistics and probability (with a focus on "evaluating claims" as you say, more about that in a bit), and I would further make a "reading critically" class mandatory
Yes, these are two of my highest priorities!
The one thing I would differ in may be terminology -- I would absolutely have problem sets! However, they would be problem sets of the "evaluating claims" type.
Yeah, that's just a terminology difference: I've been using "problem set" to mean "working through a calculation" as opposed to other sorts of questions. Your "problem sets" I would just call "homework questions."
NOT "can you calculate a standard deviation," it's "can you think critically about this claim/piece of data? Let's practice doing that." This is not a skill that kids are necessarily practicing!
YES.
(Honestly, if the majority of students got out of high school understanding that correlation is not causation, and that A implies B does NOT mean that B implies A, I would feel like this was a huge win!)
THANK YOU.
I don't care a fig whether kids get out of school knowing that you use the quadratic formula to solve a quadratic equation (much less knowing the formula itself)
YES.
(unless you're a technical person, in which case, sure, you should understand this stuff)
Exactly!
Okay, we are on the same page more than I thought, I thought I was the only one with these opinions! Or, you know, not literally, but the only person I knew. I've encountered them online/in books, but only rarely.
Re: Curriculum overhaul
if I could redesign the curriculum I would not require non-technically-oriented students to take advanced algebra/trig/etc. Nothing over, probably, Algebra I or so (and I'm not even totally sure about that)
YES PLEASE. I would keep enough algebra to teach at least the concepts of solving for a variable and when you might need to know it, and how to learn it, and then...most of the details can be left to the person to decide when they need to know it.
AND everyone should take statistics and probability (with a focus on "evaluating claims" as you say, more about that in a bit), and I would further make a "reading critically" class mandatory
Yes, these are two of my highest priorities!
The one thing I would differ in may be terminology -- I would absolutely have problem sets! However, they would be problem sets of the "evaluating claims" type.
Yeah, that's just a terminology difference: I've been using "problem set" to mean "working through a calculation" as opposed to other sorts of questions. Your "problem sets" I would just call "homework questions."
NOT "can you calculate a standard deviation," it's "can you think critically about this claim/piece of data? Let's practice doing that." This is not a skill that kids are necessarily practicing!
YES.
(Honestly, if the majority of students got out of high school understanding that correlation is not causation, and that A implies B does NOT mean that B implies A, I would feel like this was a huge win!)
THANK YOU.
I don't care a fig whether kids get out of school knowing that you use the quadratic formula to solve a quadratic equation (much less knowing the formula itself)
YES.
(unless you're a technical person, in which case, sure, you should understand this stuff)
Exactly!
Okay, we are on the same page more than I thought, I thought I was the only one with these opinions! Or, you know, not literally, but the only person I knew. I've encountered them online/in books, but only rarely.