Make Math Moments Academy › Forums › Community Discussion › Water Cooler › Why teach Math? › Reply To: Why teach Math?
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This is my basic answer. Math is NOT algebra! Math is finding patterns and analyzing them. Algebra is just a tool that can be used to do this. In some ways I feel like we teaching high school math in the wrong way. Algebra should be a tool that is taught AFTER students are beginning to understand the need for it. Unfortunately too many of our standards and end of year tests require the ability to do algebraic manipulations, so we teach that first and sometimes only.
I guess in a way, that is MY big question, how do we teach all of algebra in a way that it is needed and not just a lesson in how to follow an algorithm?