Chapter 2 Summary & Thoughts

Chapter 2 is entitled, "What's Going Wrong in Classrooms?". This chapter introduced the phenomenon of "math wars" which is described as, "a series of unproductive and heated exchanges between advocates of different mathematics approaches" (Boaler 31). The war in a California classroom was between the "traditional curriculum" and a "reformed curriculum". Groups of people are trying to save the traditional math curriculum which consists of students sitting in isolation, doing math problems from their books. In a reform curriculum students would discuss math and teachers would try to make math more meaningful to the students. 

I believe that discussion in a mathematics classroom is essential. Going through traditional math classes when I was younger was very unhelpful for me. I remember sitting at my desk, in silence, and not doing anything because I had no idea how to do the problems. Getting all of the students engaged and discussing math I feel would definitely benefit all of the students. I believe that more students would understand the math better and it would be more meaningful to them. Educators need to realize math is not just memorization and just repeating problems and skills. There is so much more to math. I believe that getting students more engaged in math classrooms is essential for success of all students.