Schooltastic

Continuing my math rant from the previous post, here are some more math terms that make no sense:

“Carry the one”

I can’t emphasize this enough: it’s not a one!  Using the sequential columnar algorithm that I was taught in third grade, let’s take a look at 19 + 19 = ____.  First, I would add the two nines, getting 18.  Then, I would put down the eight (what did eight ever do to deserve that?) and “carry the one.”  It’s not a one; it’s a ten!  All I’m doing is writing it in the ten’s place.  Since that’s all I’m doing, why does it have to go way the heck up on top?

“Gozinta”

If I have 20 cookies to pass out to five kids, a teacher from my childhood might ask me how many times five “gozinta” 20.  It doesn’t.  20 is not an empty vessel, it’s a quantity.  A better question would be, “How many fives would it take to build 20?”

"Borrow”

In the problem 22 – 14 = ____ , using the traditional algorithm, the first step would be “two minus four,” to which, the first response would be “You can’t do that.”  This is patently false; of course you can.  The solution to this contrived dilemma is to “borrow one” from the tens place.  It’s not “one,” it’s ten, and you’re not “borrowing” it.  What you’re doing is redistributing denominations.  You’re taking one of your ten-dollar bills and exchanging it for ten ones.

Already, the subtraction process has become so unnecessarily convoluted that it defies all meaning.  A student can only follow the steps as prescribed, devoid of understanding, and hopefully arrive at the correct answer.  By this same process, “carry the one” and “gozinta” rob math of its meaning.

Math isn’t the only part of our language in which we use anachronisms and euphemisms to cloud meaning; there are many times we don’t mean what we say or say what we mean.  I only want to make things as clear as possible for young children, to give them the best chance possible to develop a real understanding of math.