All children in England will need to know up to their 12 times table when they leave primary school under plans announced by the education secretary.
And Nicky Morgan tells the Sunday Times pupils aged 11 should know correct punctuation, spelling and grammar.
As a child, I endured rote learning. Which, for some, works well enough. For others, like me it doesn’t work at all. We had to learn our times tables and when we had learned them, we had to stand in front of the class and recite them. I got as far as two and then, only just. Three defeated me. I never did get to twelve, nor even close. Because, and I can’t restate this enough, we do not all learn in the same way. So unless Nicky Morgan has some magic formula up her sleeve, she is simply setting children up to fail.
English, on the other hand, I grasped easily. Today, I’m moderately numerate and highly literate. Much of what I learned, though, is self-taught after I left formal education. If the plan is to go back to the hell-on-Earth mathematics misery I endured at school, this is a bad thing indeed. There are better ways to teach mathematics. I can’t remember PIN numbers, but I do see patterns. An ex-teacher colleague of mine once remarked that this would be the starting point to teaching me mathematics, not learning times tables by rote.
The Sunday Times says that as part of the proposed measures, children would have to pass tests in long division and multiplication before they start secondary school.
And if they simply can’t? What then? Keep them back until they are eighteen? Maths didn’t really make sense to me until my father explained the geometry involved in putting roofs on buildings. I was in my mid teens by then. Previously, it had been a mystery. And if reciting my times tables up to twelve was a barrier to attending secondary school, I’d still be waiting.
“Some will say this is an old-fashioned view, but I say that giving every child the chance to master the basics and succeed in life is a fundamental duty of any government.”
No, it’s not old-fashioned. It is two-dimensional, though. I still cannot recite my times tables by heart and never will. I have managed to succeed in life perfectly well without them. If I do need to work something out, it takes a little longer, that’s all.
Mrs Morgan said the previous Labour government had failed a generation by leaving an education system “in which every third child left primary school unable to read, write or add up properly”.
“This government won’t tolerate failure in any school. The future of our children is too important for that,” she added.
She is right about Labour and the catalogue of failure they left behind – which is why they have no place being in government. However, failure happens. We cannot be good at everything. Basic literacy and numeracy is an admirable goal. However, unless there is a dynamic approach to teaching it, those who do not learn in this way will be failed by the system. Again.
Why the 12 times table? that was there so we could count in L.S.D. Now we have gone decimal surly up to the 10 times table is adequate.
Indeed.
I suspect that your failure to learn multiplication tables is affected by expectation effect and self-fulfilling prophecy: you think you can’t do it, therefore you can’t.
Have you ever learned the words to a song?
If so, didn’t you learn by repetition?
Whether or not there are other suitable ways of learning Maths doesn’t invalidate my point.
There certainly are other ways, but to say that you can’t learn by rote: well, I’m not at all sure about that.
Yes, I’ve remembered the words of a song, yet when I went to call my wife the other evening to tell her I was delayed by an accident on the M4 I couldn’t remember my phone number. I have an excellent memory for shapes, patterns, places and such, but random numbers, no. If a number sequence has a pattern, then I will remember it. So I don’t know what my PINs are, but I can see the shape they make on the keypad. I can’t instantly recall what 12 x 8 is, so I’ll simply add 80 to 16. I will just take the nearest one I can remember and add or subtract accordingly. It works for me.
Trying to teach me to learn by rote is to ignore my learning style and the way my brain is wired. Teaching should always be centred around the needs of the learner. I spent a year in primary school desperately trying to learn by rote and failed. At that point, there was no self-fulfilling prophesy because I had no expectations. My dislike of rote learning is as a consequence of that experience, so it’s retrospective.
The article doesn’t mention learning by rote, it says pupils will have to take a test on the 12 times table. If that is the case, your method would be acceptable.
I can neither recite times tables or do long division / multiplication.
I remember being taught long division near the end of primary school, totally not getting it and finally finishing at that school to move on to secondary. I never saw a long division or multiplication again and never needed one to my knowledge.
Under this system I would still be in primary school. Although they couldn’t let me in as a 39 year old as I might be a peado. What would they do?
Unless you are an engineer or someone who uses such maths, long division is a pointless exercise. Simple addition, division, multiplication and subtraction is all we need and working behind a bar hones the skill well enough.
“Under this system I would still be in primary school. Although they couldn’t let me in as a 39 year old as I might be a peado. What would they do?”
They’d give you a media studies degree.
I have to disagree with you. We learned them by rote and if given any numbers between 2 and 12 I can have the answer instantly today because of this. Long division and multiplication were also straightforward if you were taught correctly how to work them out. If this eludes some children then they will have to take remedial classes at secondary school. How will they cope with algebra?
oooh, lesseee, when did I last need algebra? Oh, that’s right, never. Basic numeracy is a useful life skill. Advanced mathematics is only of use to those who need it in later life. Therefore should be an option for those who want to pursue it. Not necessary for the rest of us.
As for learning by rote it fails dismally to teach understanding. And if you want to retain knowledge in your long term memory, understanding is the best way to do it. One of the things about teaching for a living, is that it teaches you about how people learn – and I wouldn’t dream of using rote learning as a means of educating my students – I explain to them why things are what they are. Not just that is the way that they are, because I know damned well they won’t remember it if I did.
There is a point to be made about the quality of teaching, of course. But my underlying point was demonstrated when I saw how maths was put into practice in the real world before I could understand. No amount of rote learning would do that. We have different learning styles. Fail to take that into account and you set students up to fail.
“when did I last need algebra? Oh, that’s right, never.” But you were doing algebra when you mentally converted 12×8 to 80+16. You were ahead of your peers and didn’t know it.
Touché.
If this eludes some children then they will have to take remedial classes at secondary school. How will they cope with algebra?
Buy a calculator?
I have one that performs all sorts of mathematical wizardry; Sine, Cosine, Pi, algebraic functions, the works. Cheap as chips, it was.
I never learned my times tables either, and my work involves constant basic mental arithmetical calculations. It’s never been a problem.
Like our host, I’ve always had problems remembering numbers. Rote learning also doesn’t work with me, and never has. (My memory only really works with music and melody: I can play any tune I hear on a piano. I don’t tend to remember song lyrics though, barring perhaps the first line or two.)
Algebra? I was taught it. I know I was: I took A Level Maths no less than three times. My grade got *worse* with each attempt.
Despite this obviously crippling handicap, I still managed to make a living as a computer programmer for many years. Turns out programming is just a synonym for translation.
We need to get away from Victorian teaching methods. Rote learning works for *some*, but not all. One of the key problems with such methods is that they often lack any attempt at contextualising the material. You have to learn long division, but nobody ever explains why it’s useful. This isn’t the 1950s, when “computer” was defined in a dictionary as “a person who computes”.
Ditto for algebra, trigonometry, geometry, and so on. Many of us find it much easier to learn something when we understand the “why” of it, not just the “what” and the “how”. The human brain works by making *connections*, not just by storing random facts. It’s an intelligent pattern-matching machine, not a disk drive.
Tell me *why* I need to learn X, and show me how it’s useful in a real-world example. If you can’t do that, it’s probably not worth teaching to begin with. Most of us do, after all, have very advanced computers in our pockets these days. Teaching kids long division is like teaching carpentry using flint axes. We’re a tool-using species; it makes no sense to ignore that. You can always have a “History of…” lesson that explains how things *used* to be done in the past, and there’s certainly no lack of solid educational information out there on the Internet if we want to learn more. There’s no need to force everyone to learn outdated information and techniques. We have a massive connected network of networks that didn’t exist 22 years ago. Stop pretending it still doesn’t.
Teachers need to be *guides*, not drill instructors. Learning is what Homo Sapiens evolved to do, but the Victorians really knew how to suck all the fun out of it. So much so that many people leave school relieved by the (dangerous) notion that they never have to learn anything else ever again!
Human knowledge is expanding by the second. There’s only a finite amount of time in which to stuff students full of *relevant* information that will prepare them for the wider world, so stop wasting it on outdated crap. It’s idiotic and counter-productive.
Explain the why. Explain the context. Stop cluttering up our brains with useless, worthless facts and trivia that will only ever be shouted at a TV while watching a quiz show. We have more important things to teach.
Yes. This. Absolutely.
I was pretty hopeless at learning tables as well. The odd thing is that the odd bits and bobs that did stick are quite useful to me when I need to do some calculations. Is the little bit of time I save worth the hours that I put in learning this stuff? Probably not. I have used algebra since I left school because my job involves electronics and pneumatics.
On the issue of one size fits all education, I can see that this leaves us with a far from ideal situation. At present we seem to be stuck with either that or the other extreme where every little darling is so special that the entire education system needs to pander to their every need. Maybe there could be a system where different schools use different approaches to get the best results out of their students. But then how long would it take to work out which one was right for you? Certainly these questions are too difficult for our witless politicians to answer.
It doesn’t need to be that complicated, frankly. Anyone who teaches will recognise learning styles and adapt accordingly. I can always tell by the glazed eyes that I need to take a different approach and if I have to spend a few minutes going over something using a different tack, then so be it. School teachers have their charges for much longer than I do, so will be able to alter their style and adapt on an ongoing basis having become aware of individuals’ learning needs.
Being mathematically dyspraxic, I could never learn my tables I could not even conquer 3x and I was taught by rout too and have to agree it’s not ideal for everyone, it set me up for utter failure an pushed me to a frame of mind where I was told I was a stupid child and believed such.
Each of you is very much ‘me and my’. It is not about you.
State education is to ready the mass of people for commerce and especially to create tax paying people.
The rest will be on welfare of some fancy name.
There’s a limit to how much tax people will be able to pay if an increasing proportion of the populace is incapable of earning sufficient money. Too many dribbling idiots and the only viable solution will be a mass cull.
The UK’s economy has moved away from low-skill, low-education jobs. You won’t find a lot of job openings in banking and finance if you don’t have a clue about either, and you’re not going to have one if you lack a decent education.
Education is all about me and my just as it is about you and they. The samples here have demonstrated precisely why the system failed us. Returning to it will fail another generation.
I don’t think that the education failed me, despite the ‘just going through the motions’ style of teaching that I received in the 1970s. I left school reasonably numerate and literate and that was enough to ensure that I never stopped learning. I have spent very little time out of work since leaving school in 1975 so I at least turned into a productive member of society.
@John Malpas
It is only about me because I am relating my own personal experience of learning by rote and my general exposure to the education system. I’m not really qualified to comment on the experience of others.
I did much as you did. However, the teaching I received was variable to say the least. Being told that I would never be able to write coherently and so on, did wonders for my confidence. I found the whole experience pretty negative, frankly and couldn’t wait to get free of it.
No, most of what I have learned has been post school.
Norm Abrahams* taught me a hundred times more about woodwork than my school woodwork teacher ever did.
*Has a TV show called The New Yankee Workshop.
Decimalisation destroyed our children’s abilities to think. Counting became so easy, much better than our old fashioned base twelve system for small change. Much better than the old fashioned base sixteen for light things, base fourteen for heavier things. Much better than having to actually think. Much better than having a population doing things like, actually, thinking. Decimalisation has decimated our children’s brains. They have been given easy questions with easy answers. Once done, it’s done, there’s no going back. We’re ferked, or at least one 32nd of an inch from being ferked. Don’t forget that it’s all based on Napoleon’s todger.
Bollocks
The INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM OF UNITS is just that – international
Used by (almost) every scientist & engineer on the planet.
Though, being able to work equally easily in both systems (as I can) is even better.
HINT: I first started using what was then called the “mks” (metre/kilogram/second) system in school in 1960
That’s 55 years ago – & some people STILL CAN’t COPE after all this time?
Pathetic.