Common Core Makes It Okay To Get The Wrong Answer???

3 x 4 = 11

Okay, I am still seeing this Fox article circulating the Internet. Here is the quote that caught my eye that prompted this post:

 From Fox News Glyn Wright, executive director of Eagle Forum, told FoxNews.com. “With the new math standard in the Common Core, there are no longer absolute truths. So 3 times 4 can now equal 11 so long as a student can effectively explain how they reached that answer.”  

First off there is one pretty important word in this quote that is being overlooked by Fox News and that is effectively.

Let us take two scenarios on this particular situation.

Scene 1 :

                 Student:  I know the answer, it is 11.

                 Teacher: No, that is incorrect.  The answer is 12.

My evaluation of this teaching situation: 

Those of you that have read my previous blogs know that I have a very strong believe in growing dendrites and having a growth mindset not a fixed mind set. When the student does not figure out the answer correctly him or herself and is just told they are incorrect, they have been denied the opportunity to process information and grow dendrites.  Why are dendrites important?  They are the part of your brain that helps you do things, in this case problems solving skills would be improved. 

Being told that he is wrong and then being given the correct answer will not teach him how he should derived the answer himself if there is not a teacher around to help him. He probably will not even bother to memorize the answer and  be able to use rote memory in the future as how was he motivation to learn by being told that he was wrong and given the answer?  Who wants to volunteer again in front of their peers only to be shot down with a no, you are wrong. Again, self-motivation is an important quality, and actually indirectly one of the  standards in common core as if you are not motivated how can you have tenacity. The first common core standard is:

CCSS.MATH.PRACTICE.MP1 Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them.

Scene 2:  

                    Student:  I know, the answer is 11.

                    Teacher:  How did you figure that out?

                    Student:  Because, 3 times 4 is 12.

                    Teacher:  What does times mean?

                    Student:  I am not sure.

                    Teacher:  Will you draw me a picture of how you figured out the answer.

                     Student: Okay

                     Student:  Oh, I think I miscounted, it is 12.

                     Teacher:  I like how you were able to check your answer and figure out  the correct answer.  

                       Another Student:  I figured it out a different way.

                       Teacher:  Please show us.

                       Another Student:  I already knew that two 3's make 6 so this is what I did in my brain.

                        A Third Student: Wait, I figured it out a 3rd way.

                        Teacher: Okay, let us see your way.

                        A Third Student: I have memorized that 3 x 3 is 9 so I only needed one more three, so this is how I did it in my brain.

                       Teacher:  So you already knew what three times three was so you just had to add another 3.  Anyone else want to show us another way?

                       Last Student:  Yes, I do.  I know my five's times tables so I already knew that  5 x 3 is 15, so I only had to take 1 group of three away to get 12.

                        

So now the first student will feel he or she has the skills to do math, rather than the first scenario where he or she will eventually give up.  All the students now how more than one strategy to figure out a multiplication problem if they were actively participating in the classroom discussion.

So the student now also used another common core standard.

CCSS.MATH.PRACTICE.MP4 Model with mathematics.

Quote from Ed Glossary "In education, student engagement refers to the degree of attention, curiosity, interest, optimism, and passion that students show when they are learning or being taught, which extends to the level of motivation they have to learn and progress in their education."

So which classroom scene would you like your child to be taught?  Which classroom has the most learning going on?  The most engaged students? Mr. Perry Chiaramonte what do you think? Fox news?

Please comment below.

Further suggested reading:

YouCubed           Cabrillo Edu        Common Core Math