Taking Advantage of Technology – Moving Forward
For those of you
that are not familiar with my first post, I am a proponent of calculator use. I
believe that calculators should be incorporated more into the teaching
curriculum so that students are less stressed out about the mechanical task of
calculating and can focus more on the mathematical concepts. You can then
imagine my surprise when my daughter told me that she could not use a calculator
for her SAT subject tests.
My daughter has
always been good with sciences and math. When deciding which subject tests to
take for the SAT, she wanted to go with mathematics and chemistry. However,
when she learned that she could not use calculator during her chemistry test,
this changed the equation. She opted to take the physics subject test instead
because the numbers were easier to work with.
Chemistry, in
particular, deals with very small unit of measurement (mg and ml). And it makes
sense that students are allowed to use calculators in the classroom to solve the math problems. For
example, students should understand the nuclear chain reaction in nuclear power
plants. They should know how to calculate the amount
of radioactive materials needed in a nuclear power plant. However, they
shouldn’t have to worry about the mechanics of that calculation. That’s what
calculators are for!
Our current
education system is quite full of contradictions. If students could use
calculators in the classroom, why couldn’t they use them in their aptitude
test? This makes me wonder:
How well can
standardized tests like the SAT predict college success?
NOT THAT WELL!
In a 20-year
study of the SAT’s ability to predict college success, William Hiss, the former
dean of admissions at Bates College in Maine, found that SAT scores did not
correlate with students’ success in college. The study looked at 123,000
students from 33 public and private institutes from 20 states. The results
showed that SAT was a poor predictor of college success. Instead, GPA was a
much better indicator of student’s performance in college. (For a video interview with Dr. Hiss, click here)
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| Image retrieved from www.quickmeme.com |
SAT is not the
only test that restricts students’ use of calculator. The Medical College
Admission Test (MCAT) also prohibits students from using calculators. Many
mathematics teachers continued to disallow calculators during tests. It dawns on me that our education system is still not open to the idea of using technology.
I agree that our children need to understand how to do basic math. They need to
know that two plus two is four. They need to know how to calculate tips for the
waiters. However, our technology is far too advanced nowadays to waste time on
manual calculating. Giving students calculators to work through their math
problems does not mean that we are crippling them, making them dependent on calculators. It is
giving them the time they need to focus on more important tasks at hand. Whether
one is able to perform pencil-and-paper calculation is not a measurement of
their intelligence. Our nation’s greatest minds – chemists, engineers,
physicists, doctors and scientists – all use calculators in their work. Imagine
how long it would take NASA scientists to put their astronauts in space if they
did not rely on calculators! We would never be able to put our feet on the moon.
Technology is
advancing. We are advancing. We need to move forward.
Let students
use calculators in their classroom and in their test!
As always, please leave comments below and let me know what you think.
Hey Thuy,
ReplyDeleteAfter reading your first and second blog posts, now I totally understand what you are saying. As I am a Korean- American, when I recall my elementary, middle, and high school memories back in the days, nobody used calculators from my mother land, they have done all the detail calculation by hand. I know that you do not want to say using calculator has to be prohibited or some, but I know your point that learning the way to calculate the mathematical problems without a calculator might help our children to improve their brain function.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThuy,
ReplyDeleteI think your article makes a ton of sense. You also used some good resources. Its good to understand the concepts of math but people are not solving complex problems with a pencil anymore. The calculator is truly one of the most basic forms of technology around.
Hello Thuy,
ReplyDeleteI both agree and disagree with the use of a calculator. I think that it is necessary for young students to gain proficient math skills such as adding, multiplying, and dividing without a calculator as this is the basis of mathematics. After gaining these basic skills I think it is appropriate to use a calculator to speed up and check calculations. For me personally in my engineering and science classes I always rely on the accuracy and speed of calculators. In some sense doing advance college level physics, math and engineering problems a calculator is an absolute require. I think it is important to use technology as a tool and not a crutch.
Joe
Hi Thuy,
ReplyDeleteI agree with Joe's post - I both disagree and agree on the use of using a calculator because there are advantages and disadvantages to using it. While I understand your point on how we will always be using calculators for the rest of our lives, it is important that we able able to do basic math equations without calculators in order to prove our capability of solving problems without relying on "others" so to speak. One should first learn how to become independent and gain confidence in their own math skills rather than rely on something else for the rest of their life. Still, once you come to college, I think you should be able to use calculators because high school was when you learned how to do math on your own without them and you've already had the exposure and experience with relying on yourself. Alas, the rule still hasn't changed :P However, I completely agree with your stance on the SAT. I think it's completely stupid that colleges rely so heavily on SAT scores and use them to judge whether to accept someone into their college or not. I don't think SAT scores say anything about a person - I know someone who graduated with a 4.5 and got an 1820 on the SAT. Her first score was around 1600. So I definitely agree with your stance on that.
I think you make a very convincing point about the use of calculators on tests. If you understand the concept but mess up on some basic arithmetic, that shouldn't invalidate your entire answer. I also agree that SAT results don't adequately represent a student's aptitude for college. For example, I did very well on my SATs (I got a perfect score on my Math 2 subject test), but college has been much more of a challenge. At some point, it becomes about workload and that's why GPA is probably so much of a better indicator. It becomes about how you can manage your work and your time. I think that especially with your example of the MCAT, it doesn't many any sense at all to prohibit the use of computers. You're trying to assess medical knowledge, not arithmetic!
ReplyDeleteAlso, on a more aesthetic note, your use of headings and images makes your posts very easy to read. They look very professional!
Hello Thuy,
ReplyDeleteI like your current even article about SATs. I never understood why we were not allowed to use calculator on the SATs since they were allowed on SOLs and others exams. I am horrible with arithmetic but that does not mean I do not know how to solve the problem. My parents have always said that I would be better at math if I did not rely so heavily on calculators. Older generations believe that it is better to solve by hand because it is quicker but I do not think it really matters how the answer is found as long as it is right. I definitely agree with your stand point.
Thuy,
ReplyDeleteI agree with your view point of using calculators for math problems. It right that it should not be used from the beginning and kids should be able to understand the basic math, but in higher studies and higher tests they should be able to concentrate on the other skills and methods rather than trying to solve the whole big math problems on the fingers. I came from India and there even in colleges, we were never encouraged to use calculators and we were praised if we did our problems without calculators. I agree it is great brain exercise but we need to set our priorities. The time saved from burning your brain on doing problems that can be used for learning other productive skill. Thanks for an interesting and thought provoking post.