In article <ehrebeniuk-A70A49.09440216052008@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
Chookie <ehrebeniuk@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>In article <gc6rf5-6lg.ln1@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, Penny Gaines <penny@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>wrote:
>> Beliavsky wrote:
[snip]
>> > Most people are not smart enough to go to college, but they can be
>> > productive members of society. People who have not mastered algebra
>> > should not be in college in the first place.
>> Why not?
>> Probably one factor in your view is your opinion of what college is
for.
>> I don't want to speak for individuals, but it seems that Americans
>> tend to think of college as being a place to provide a broad knowledge
>> in several subject areas, whereas in the UK the aim of tertiary
>> education is to continue the specialisation that students started when
>> they were 14yo.
>At FOURTEEN? Isn't that a trifle early to specialise?
It is too early to specialize even if one is a genius in
a field. I do not mean one must take a huge variety of
courses, but the basic knowledge in the various fields
I find highly desirable; the problem now is to get at
the core without having to go through the trivia which
is claimed to be needed for it.
In my opinion, those who are capable of a good college
program in any of the sciences should be taking nothing
but first-class college courses in the sciences BEFORE
the age of 14, and having something on which to decide.
>We make choices in our last two years of high school which can (but often
do
>not) affect the courses we do afterwards. Our Unis are more like the
British
>model, so at age 18 I started a BA, expecting to major in Psychology. I
was
>able to take other subjects as well, and in fact my interests changed and
I
>ended up with a BA (Hons) in Russian Studies.
>My impression is that our last two years of high school cover material at
the
>early US college level, so that the levels of competence are similar by
the
>time a student gets to a real degree.
>> If you are going to study history, or languages, why do you need
>> mathematics? You can get into Oxford or Cambridge Universities (in the
>> UK) with no formal mathematics qualification, which if you are British,
>> means you may be unable to master algebra.
>What, you don't encounter statistics in history? I can't think of any
>immediate use for maths in language study, I admit.
There are some. There is a classification of speech
sounds, and there are studies made of word frequencies.
There have been attempts to identify authors, in which
I have taken an interest myself, and good methods are
very difficult, and do not involve what linguists thought
were the key components. Come up with a provably fair
way, and that would be a PhD thesis.
[snip]
>> > It's more likely that people who cannot grasp algebra are limited in
>> > "developing critical thinking skills" because they are not that
>> > smart..
[snip]
>> Wouldn't you say that being able to read complex written do***ents and
>> being able to select the most relevant points is a major part of
>> "critical thinking skills", and is irrelevant to algebra.
>Completely relevant to algebra. If you can't extract the relevant bits
from
>the information presented, you can't formulate an algebraic expression to
>solve. Similar critical thinking skills -- different object of
application
>and different form of production. Not that I agree that a person who
cannot
>grasp algebra is thick; I think it far more likely that they were poorly
>taught and have no confidence in themselves as a result.
--
This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views
are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University.
Herman Rubin, Department of Statistics, Purdue University
hrubin@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558
|
