Reply To: Lesson 4-2: Automaticity vs. Memorization

[Christine Pomatto]

It’s interesting to hear that the “Back to Basics” vs. “Discovery and Inquiry” argument has been going on so long. When I started teaching, Common Core was in full force and had been for several years. It’s frustrating to listen to non-teachers complain about “Common Core math” when they have never even looked at the standards or practices. Sure, they have their faults, but in a perfect world, they do point students toward a deeper understanding than they would gain through pure memorization. I do still think there’s value in “knowing” math facts, but it truly is useless if students don’t know what those facts mean. I’ll be curious to see what else you have to say about exploring interesting math to build understanding of math facts.