Jeff Schrier - The Saginaw News
In the news this month:
Newtown Friends Quaker School believes that:
The Singapore program is “just a better way to teach,” said Schade. “The depth that you go into with Singapore math provides students the opportunity to solve problems in so many ways.”
Midlothian School adopts Singapore Math
The first school to adopt Singapore Math in the Archdiocese of Chicago likes that:
Singapore Math emphasizes problem-solving and model-drawing, with a focus on an in-depth understanding of the essential math skills recommended by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.
Saginaw Township elementary schools implement hands-on Singapore math program
Best quote from the article:
“Math is math, this is just a consistent way of presenting it to students,” Braun said.
And an “eek!” quote:
…materials were $220,720 and six days of intensive training was $75,982.**
Goodbye Flashcards, Hello Singapore
Fair Haven K-8 school in New Haven, CT is in their first year using Singapore math and anecdotally, teachers feel that students are better problem-solvers and are learning concepts to mastery. According to district math coordinator Ken Mathews:
There’s no official measure yet of whether students have gotten better at math under the new approach. The quarterly district assessments have changed to adapt to the new curriculum, so year-to-year comparisons don’t make sense.
The district finds that the Singapore approach aligns well to the Common Core:
The shift to Singapore math comes as the New Haven takes part in the Common Core State Standards Initiative, whereby districts and states are aligning assessments and curriculae to a new national standard. Connecticut is one of 45 states that have pledged to do so, with the hopes of being more competitive internationally. New Haven plans to overhaul its math and literacy curriculae by the 2014-15 school year, including the full implementation of Singapore math.
About Cassy Turner
My school has decided to pilot the program in grades k-1. If there are any k-1 teachers out there who can offer advise and support for my teachers, please feel free to respond to this post. Also, in respond to another post, why did your district spend so much money? Singapore Math is extremely affordable and there are numerous ways to conduct training and professional development at reasonable cost.
Congratulations to your school its choice to pilot Singapore Math! Just to be clear, I’m not associated with the Saginaw Township schools so I can not say why their training was so costly ($76,000 on training on six days of training on Singapore Math?)
As an independent Singapore Math teacher, trainer and consultant, my overhead is relatively low, especially when compared to larger firms offering professional development. I strive to offer schools adopting the Singapore curriculum exceptional training at a reasonable cost.
As I jokingly said when posting this story, I’d be happy to collect $76,000 for six days of intensive training (though, in good conscience, I couldn’t do that).
Be sure to check my Training pages above.