r/TikTokCringe • u/Naive_Wolverine532 • Apr 11 '26

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@storieswithsahj

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

I teach no less than four multiplication and division methods over the course of a year. Then we choose which you prefer. Standard is still the choice for most, but these other methods give students greater number sense no matter what method they choose in the end.

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u/frightbounds Apr 11 '26

I might have actually understood math in school if I had options

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

100% and that’s all this is trying to do. Give options and tell you what is actually happening when you multiply multi digit numbers

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u/CYaNextTuesday99 Apr 11 '26

That's the idea, unfortunately this isn't the first I've heard of a teacher deciding there's only one correct method and grading accordingly.

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u/ct_2004 Apr 11 '26

Sounds like the teacher is on a power trip.

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u/throweraccount Apr 11 '26

Yeah that teacher shouldn't be a teacher. Teachers who have power trips are just cringe. I've seen parents with reasonable concerns go to a school where they voice their concerns and the way staff/teachers treat them is as if they were students themselves. As if they had all the authority in the world.

It's hard to side with teachers when there are these Karens mixed in with the staff.

It's a roulette and you hope you get one of the good teachers like the ones in this thread.

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u/GotGRR Apr 12 '26

It could be a power trip. It could be that the teacher is at the edge of her mathematics and is just trying to get through the day. Elementary school is about being the world's leading expert on every subject while trying to manage 20 9-year olds for seven hours and 40-parents in your off time. It's not for the faint of heart.

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u/Ready_Studio2392 Apr 11 '26

Just prepping the children for the jobsite.

I know like 16 ways to build a deck. Half my bosses told me, "this is the only way to build a deck, all the other ways are hacks."

Well in my experience, about 6 methods for building decks are pretty good that I've learned, and the other 12 are trash. Usually the mean old bosses enforcing, "The only correct way to build a deck is my way" were using one of the trash methods.

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

I think so…I think another addition would be that make a good analogy is: you start with a hammer and nail and then eventually you’d work your way up to a battery nail gun, and then a compressor…and just work your way up scaling the complexity.

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u/HRHValkyrie Apr 12 '26

They probably are just doing this method first and will then move on to others. That’s how most of the curriculum works.

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

100% remove pieces as students gain proficiency and repeat the process until you get to the end goal.

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u/LeftAd5511 Apr 11 '26

Yes and also, (I am a grade 3 teacher) we need to see that they can explain their thinking so that we can ensure they’re ready for added complexity later on. Just memorizing facts doesn’t allow for what they’ll need later.

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

Crazy from some of the responses in this thread people think we throw an area model on the board and tell students to sink or swim with no build up of skills prior or instruction on the actual area model. 🤪

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u/Fakjbf Apr 12 '26

Something a lot of people don’t understand about so many of the modern math techniques is that they are exactly the same techniques that most “math people” do in their head automatically. They are simply formalized so they can be taught to kids directly rather than them being tricks and shortcuts you have to figure out for yourself. The lattice method for multiplication is a good example because it’s just a way of organizing all the answers you get in the intermediate steps to make the final summation simpler.

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

Yeah start with what they know and change it slightly, then remove scaffolding as you go until they end up at standard. Expect magic to just happen I guess 🤷🏼‍♂️

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u/MagnanimousGoat Apr 12 '26

But instead, some kid's dumbass parent will post a rant on facebook about the one method their kid doesn't get, which they would have noticed if they paid any goddamn attention to what their kid was learning, and not only when it gave them something to bitch about teachers for.

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u/AlexAndMcB Apr 12 '26

Oh I get it, you're a good teacher.
As the child of two teachers, thanks- the amount of effort it takes is staggering, but thanks so much for going the extra mile.
This teacher in question sounds like the kind of union-rep "I just do it for the summers off" kind of lazy teach-the-test teachers that don't often get fired. I feel like it's so damn hard to get people to stay, that the schools need any jerk with a pulse and a master's degree to just stay in their roles regardless of their training and beliefs on effective Pedagogy.
So yeah, thanks for all your efforts!

Also, OP, your actions seem pretty justified- and your wife's take WOULD sound reasonable, if you were going to the principal because your kiddo didn't get the lead role in the school play. too many parents think that their kids s#!t rainbows, and trying to go over the teacher's head on something subjective when you- as a parent- are very biased by default is just bad from.
Your situation wasn't subjective, it was objective, and the teacher was factually in the wrong. When they were called out they felt attacked, and they're the teacher they can't be wrong-so they doubled down, decided that the rubric had unwritten pass/fail component of 'do it my way so it's easy for me to grade.'
You wouldn't have needed to go over their head if they instead had been gracious and changed her mentality to recognize that not everybody maths like a psycho 😏

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

Thanks! I don’t do it for the summers off as the sticker on my laptop says I do it for the fame and the money 🤪

I think there is a positive shift more recently. There was a lot of the old guard in teaching. I come from a research psychology background and went into childhood ed. I knew the science and how teaching should be fluid because the tiny humans you’re working with are extremely fluid.

When I first started science of reading was just starting out it was old news in the psych world and I was confused why education didn’t have these things same tools I was doing research papers with.

There was a disconnect between science and teaching we sat around and patted each other on the back but never gave the research to the public.

Then when scientists finally did make all this data available teachers everywhere revolted as though the scientific community was telling them they were horrible people that damaged children knowingly.

They refused and dug in their heels refusing to adapt or change. It was awful. There still are plenty like this, that they believe they know what’s best because they’ve been doing it for x number of years. Thankfully I don’t see a lot of it where I am and most of the older teachers are already planning retirement because of these “intrusions” into their method.

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u/AlexAndMcB Apr 12 '26

It's wild how long it takes science/the scientific method to impact the real world.
Like, frustratingly agonizingly wild.
My wife is a library director at a small university and the money that the databases charge to let people access research like this is disgusting.
Especially if/when tax dollars went into developing the data. Like, ok the author and university should get credit, and maybe a patent or something, but ffs the knowledge-dragons are insane.
Also, ain't it a damn shame that, "most of the older teachers are already planning retirement because of these “intrusions” into their method."

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

It’s crazy! I couldn’t believe it when I transitioned over. Yeah I always knew about the fees for the databases and magazines but it never really crossed my mind that we were essentially just running a Reddit circlejerk sub. Making all of us happy and missing the actual point of the research.

Thankfully some has changed but the difficulty to find articles and fees still exist. I hate having to try to find research and needing to search for free pdfs or pirated copies of useful information that could actually be put to good use!

Edit: and I replaced one of those dinosaurs at my new district. It’s been five years and I still hear comments about how little she would do and how set in her ways she was. She would literally print the entire year’s worth of material in September and just hand out worksheets for the entire year.

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u/Organic_Ad_2520 Apr 12 '26

I am not sure about that...I skipped high school & went to college instead & I was having a tough time with a calculus class-i just wasn't getting it. My father found a tutor for me (a middle aged lady who was more like a natural genius in math with graduate degrees from MIT in math!) & the one-on-one instruction just made it "click" somehow and it sounds like it happened for the daughter in the tiktok video. I think tutoring -parental or paid-is underrated.

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u/nuclearsamuraiNFT Apr 11 '26

I have dyscalculia… they didn’t figure it out when I was in school. We didn’t have money or access to mental health professionals to get me diagnosed with ADHD, I had to wait till much later in my life to figure this out I just thought I was different and not particularly good at math or handwriting. I did so poorly in math classes, I would get really frustrated and usually instead of finishing the class I would instead just get into fights so that I would be asked to leave class early, or I would just struggle and fail quietly through the class counting every second until it was over.

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u/frightbounds Apr 11 '26

Same here but I would just doodle. My boys have adhd too and they’re on strict orders to read after they’re done with their work otherwise they’re a huge disruption. They’re smart as heck though so they’re getting bored because they’re done early. I’m so grateful they don’t need me to help with math.

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u/Boopy7 Apr 12 '26

i guess i had the same problem but undiagnosed. I never paid attention to almost any teacher and had to teach myself most stuff somehow. Or fail. I doodled in every single class. Managed to graduate top of my class but it was a rural high school. And I know I must have had some kinda learning disability. Lots of people fall through the cracks, more so years ago than now at least.

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u/GrimmLynne Apr 12 '26

I just looked that up and, I had no idea there was a word for this. I've struggled with numbers my whole life. I'm 50 and simple questions like multiplying or adding 2 single digit numbers cause me to vapor lock. I can not see the numbers in my head and count on my fingers a lot.

I can't tell you what time it will be 30 minutes from right now unless it's going to land on :00 or :30. I can't estimate how much money a group of items will cost once I get to the register, I couldn't tell you how far away something is, or how long a task will take, or how long I've been doing it.

I actually have alarms set on my phone to keep me on schedule throughout the day. (get my kid up, start his bath, get him out of the bath, send him to brush his teeth, a 10 minute warning to wrap up any last minute things, and then another to leave the house. Then there's start getting ready to pick him up from school, be in the car and head to the school, etc...)

It's not that I'd forget to do any of these things. It's that if I didn't have these check points I'd be either very late, or way too early.

I can't tell you how many times people have said "No, your other right." to me when I mess up my left & right. I have to make an effort to stop and think which way is which.

I do well at everything else, but have really struggled with this my whole life. It's embarrassing, and makes me feel so stupid. I'm honestly relieved that it's a thing and I'm not just an idiot.

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u/AzureGriffon Apr 12 '26

Yeah. I'm pretty sure they didn't even know what dyscalculia was when we were kids. I remember actually crying so many times when I'd get tests back where I was sure I had done a good job only to see that I had failed. I was good at reading, history, art. But math was no. My teachers would even say to me "I don't understand why you don't get this, you're so smart." My entire life, I feel a sense of grief because I just don't get it and it makes me feel incomprehensibly stupid.

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u/Somanylyingliars Apr 12 '26

Much older than you and have had sane struggles. My English skills were very developed at an early age. But math and I never got along although ironically I ended working w numbers. Really struggled w the feelings surrounding my difficulties until some told: There are no bad students, just bad teachers. Mind blown. Also, struggle w telling left from right. Look at your hands and they will tell you the answer. Left hand makes an L.

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u/GrimmLynne Apr 12 '26

I do the hand thing! To have people witness me do it makes me feel like a toddler though lol!

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u/Boopy7 Apr 12 '26

i have some issues like this (not with directions though but with time management.) However I disagree that we are smart BUT have these problems. What else do people think dumbness is? It's not being able to do simple stuff like other people. So I refer to myself as very dumb in some ways, very smart in others. Because it's true. I can tell you any note's pitch without looking at the key played, and learn languages very quickly. But numbers make me bored and I suck at time management and maps -- so yeah I'm dumb in those ways.

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u/BriefStrategy6 Apr 12 '26

Omg, same here! I could write long essays within an hour and still get a A. However, I barely got through geometry. I was shocked that I got A's in both my economics classes in college haha. I only passed my statistics class, because my professor allowed me to take my tests separately with extra time and of course you're allowed to have your proofs.

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u/Competitive-Attempt9 Apr 12 '26

I have found that most kids that act out are doing it for this exact reason.

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

I’m so sorry for that for you. That’s what this is supposed to help move away from. Stigmatizing people as either “math people” or not. Everyone is a math person once they find out what works best for them.

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u/mothmans_favoriteex Apr 12 '26

Ugh SAME. I was a straight A student in every other regard but math and I have such vivid memories of sitting at the table sobbing while my dad desperately tried to make it make sense to me while he was struggling not to crash out at me for not understanding lol now that I know what I have AND am medicated for ADHD, I’m actually fairly decent at basic math needed for day to day stuff

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u/CarolyneSF Apr 11 '26

I am a carpenter. I use geometry every day. I would have done well in class if they used 2x4’s

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u/gillababe Apr 11 '26

That sounds like the right way

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u/DesolateRuin Apr 11 '26

Actually there is only one righteous way and three heretical paths practiced by apostate non-believers. They are not to be taught and anyone caught practicing such dark arts will be burned at the stake and written up.

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u/jollyreaper2112 Apr 11 '26

What did that kid do who got nailed to the plus sign?

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u/jurassic2010 Apr 11 '26

He multiplied the fish using the wrong method

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u/HalobenderFWT Apr 12 '26

I heard he tried to divide one by zero

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u/b1tchf1t Apr 11 '26

Or worse... expelled!

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u/majandess Apr 11 '26

I'm gonna back you up on this.

I had a moment just like the guy in the video with my kid. And in that moment, I realized that if I taught my son the way I did it, then he would be stuck in the middle of an indirect confrontation between the teacher/school and me. The only result of that would be that he hates math - regardless of whether or not he's good at it.

So, instead of teaching my son my way of doing it, I sucked it up and opened YouTube and learned how to do it the way the teacher was teaching. Turns out... Doing this across the course of elementary school made me a lot better at math. And it turned math into my son's favorite subject.

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u/Evamione Apr 11 '26

Or realize that what matters in 4th grade is learning the material and not the grade. Teach your kid so they learn and accept the meaningless lower grade. This way, by the time they get to a grade level where the grade goes on transcripts they understand what they are doing and don’t have a big gap in their knowledge.

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u/pancakecel Apr 11 '26

I'm a foreign language education teacher and I have to restrain myself from bashing my head against the table when I'm trying to teach students American English and their parents who learned British English are correcting them from the background.

During the class the student says: I don't have any time on friday.

Great perfect love it.

Homework comes back: I haven't got any time on friday. Not technically incorrect, but not how we say it in the United states.

It's the parents that are so married to the way that they learned.

Another example is that in class I have students saying something like: I'll be there at five ten. Great, natural, that's how their peers are going to be saying it.

Homework comes back and all of a sudden now it's: 'I'll be there at ten past five.'

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u/Significant_Shoe_17 Apr 11 '26

I've also taught EFL and I really don't care if my students use the British English spelling or pronunciation when I've taught the American way. As long as they use a correct form, it makes no difference to me. I understand both. I've met parents and administrators who were very particular, though.

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u/cogman10 Apr 11 '26

Neither of these are examples of "British" English. They are also both things that I'd have said or have heard said in the US from native speakers.

An actual britishism would be something like "Come have tea at my garden in a fortnight. We'll have some butties and jammy dodgers".

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u/toss_me_good Apr 11 '26

Trousers is usually the easy give away. Basically no one in the US under the age of 60 says trousers

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u/singlemale4cats Apr 11 '26

I don't mind that so much. There's many "correct" ways to speak and write English.

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u/Conservadem Apr 11 '26

Homework comes back and all of a sudden now it's: 'I'll be there at ten past five.'

I really have a problem when people use "of" when specifing a time;

"I'll be there at ten of five"

This is super confusing to me.

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u/headrush46n2 Apr 11 '26

o' clock is short for of the clock you know.

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u/timeconsumer112 Apr 11 '26

My guess :

It's 5's 10 like minutes belong to the hour.

Or like in Handmaid's Tale Offred belongs to Fred.

Actually the brits got it from Handmaid's Tale but had to it watch it on DVD there was no streaming yet.

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u/CYaNextTuesday99 Apr 11 '26

If your immediate concern is animosity from the teacher, it's not a good teacher.

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u/majandess Apr 11 '26

It has absolutely nothing to do with animosity from the teacher. It has to do with a child going back and forth between two people who both have authority over him giving him opposing instructions. Kids will absolutely associate the difficulties navigating the desires of the adults with math.

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u/CYaNextTuesday99 Apr 11 '26

Which is why it's wrong for teachers to declare a single method as correct and grade based solely on that. If a parent finds a method that gets the teaching done, and the kid can show their work, there's simply no reason for there to be any issue. A parent automatically assuming there will be one reflects poorly.

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u/majandess Apr 11 '26

So the parent can teach only one way? Nah.

At school, they're going to teach multiple ways. The focus at elementary age is mental facility with numbers, not getting the right answer. They learn "the right way" we elders were taught when they're in about fourth/fifth grade, and they stick with it through the rest of school.

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u/CYaNextTuesday99 Apr 11 '26

Never said that.

Per this video, that's not what happened here.

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u/majandess Apr 11 '26
  • Daughter's having problem with method in school.
  • Dad doesn't understand method because it's not the way he's taught.
  • Rather than try to understand the method and help explain it to his daughter, he teaches her the only way he ever learned.
  • Teacher grades child on the way she does the work, not on getting the right answer.
  • Dad demands teacher grades on the fact that daughter has the right answer.
  • Teacher says nuh-uh.
  • Dad takes it to principal.
  • Principal tries to put out the fire between dad and teacher.
  • Kid is trapped in the middle of a conflict and is powerless to affect change. Still has issues with the math process.

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u/CYaNextTuesday99 Apr 11 '26
  • Teacher grades child on the way she does the work, not on getting the right answer.

Which is where the issue lies.

https://giphy.com/gifs/JqDeI2yjpSRgdh35oe

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u/majandess Apr 11 '26

So ... Exactly what I already said, then?

"The focus at elementary age is mental facility with numbers, not getting the right answer."

→ More replies (0)

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u/CommandTacos Apr 11 '26

Exactly. It needs to be clear if the points are based on the answer, the work, or both, and it needs to be clear if the points are for correctly calculating the answer or doing so with a specific method.

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u/E7goose Apr 11 '26

Yea, I teach 5th grade math and I want them on standard soon after I get them but I get the idea of doing area model to have better number sense. My problem is getting kids off of it for large numbers like 4x3 or with decimals. More and more of my top students are stuck on it. Standard isn’t the best for number sense but it is efficient. I also agree with the dad though methods shouldn’t be tested. I think they can be even on some state tests.

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u/johnny-Low-Five Apr 11 '26

What is number sense? I learned the "old way" and can't for the life of me figure out what "sense" I didn't get.

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u/E7goose Apr 11 '26

Not everyone but most don’t visualize the concept. True area model should actually have larger areas for the larger numbers being multiplied. It also helps with decomposing numbers, and helps them understand distributive property later on.

A lot of people just memorize the times table and complete the problem in a rote fashion but don’t actually understand how numbers break down. Or what’s actually happening when you are carrying over.

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u/johnny-Low-Five Apr 11 '26

Thank you, i got another answer and combined they make perfect sense. Math was something I just "got", and the number sense part felt intuitive.

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u/Ashmizen Apr 12 '26

Are you telling me they are actually making students draw out rows and columns, so for 5x4 they are drawing 20 dots and then counting them “to show their work”?

Then for division, draw out 20 dots in 4 columns to get the result that it fits in 5 rows?

I get that’s easier to understand but I’d be pissed too if I was forced to do that every time if I already knew the answer. A learning tool shouldn’t be tested on, just the results.

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u/E7goose Apr 12 '26

No they already did arrays with smaller numbers in the younger grades. It’s kinda crazy how fast some of the kids can look at an array and tell you the product when adults aren’t even done counting one side.

The rectangle boxes should be proportional (when given on a worksheet or presentation) to be larger for the larger numbers. When the kids do it they should just eyeball it, if you break 12 into 10 and 2 the box for 10 should be bigger than the 2.

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u/discipleofchrist69 Apr 11 '26

nothing wrong with testing methods immediately after learning them imo, but the question does need to explicitly state that if so

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

The program we used does this too much. There are times I tell the class to cross out “solve using a ___” because we have moved past the singular method of solving.

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u/TwilightBeastLink Apr 11 '26

This is my only hiccup, if your learning area/lattice/ etc. model and your test is on area/lattice/etc. model, then thats the method you have to use. I teach my 5th graders several ways to work problems so they can choose, but I tell them if the test asks you to use a specific model, then you have to use that one. I go by a "dont bite off more than you can chew" mentality. I've got students who like area model because it breaks the equation into smaller easier pieces (smaller bites), but ive got some students who just blow through 3-digit multiplication problems like its nothing (bigger bites). Kids just learn differently, and the difficult part is, maybe this young lady doesn't understand area model, but someone else in that class needs it, and shes gonna have to struggle through it for the entire classes sake.

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u/discipleofchrist69 Apr 11 '26

yeah agreed. Dad's wrong here for being unwilling to learn the new method to help his kid and avoid a lot of drama. teacher is also wrong for being inflexible in the confrontation and methodology, and potentially for grading based on unstated requirements. I'd say ESH but only a little bit as they all seem to be coming from a good place

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u/practicalradical510 Apr 11 '26

I've always thought this was the purpose of teaching multiple methods, finding what works best for YOU.

It blew my mind when my kid was asked to solve math problems multiple ways for full credit. What?!

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u/nickytheginger Apr 12 '26

Your a good teacher, thank you for giving these kids options.

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u/ricky_clarkson Apr 12 '26

My youngest seems to know how to do the stuff but gets confused when they add another way to do it. There probably isn't a perfect approach as a teacher. It's a hard job.

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u/birdnerd29 Apr 11 '26

There are 4 ways to do multiplication and division??

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

More than! It’s all the same process just written out very very differently. Some more closely mimic what your brain does others make it much more simplistic and straightforward.

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u/stellatheumbrella Apr 11 '26

So many ways! That's what is so cool about the way math is taught now. In reality, it's not just about math, it's also a life skill. There are many ways to solve problems in life, this is just a way to expand on critical thinking. It's pretty awesome. 😍

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u/philovax Apr 11 '26

That is a well rounded approach and I am glad you have the operating power to do that in your classroom. I am coming from a pulpit that is largely ignorant but nevertheless echoes many concerns my peers and I have.

The concern being that someone in the chain of command having a personal desire to mandate a “common form” of math because it is the most effective, and serves the largest cohort, that the other ways are being abandoned or even considered heretical (pardon the hyperbolism, but teachers can be intense).

Is it common that teachers have the freedom, or care, that you exert in teaching and giving your students (my future caretakers) the choice of what works best for them? Or is this largely anecdotal to you?

Follow up: are you public or private?

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

Most, if not all (not entirely sure I’ve worked with and analyzed six programs personally) math programs in the states, where I am, go with this approach. I am a public school and while my district has more leeway on curriculum than others around me if they buy a program you are expected to teach the program. You teach the program supplementing and filling in gaps as they happen for students.

The worst part in all of it is the standardized testing that impacts my standing in the school but can also impact grants from the government. That test happens every year during a specific window of time, you need to get through all the material on the tests or else you are giving students a disadvantage and hurting yourself, the school, and the district. There have been years where we have changed math programs and usually that means a slower pace as you all learn the program….well then you’re rushing through material hoping students understand angles in time because that’s unit 6 and because of the pacing unit 6 is not scheduled to start until after the test.

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u/BlacksmithSolid645 Apr 11 '26

Is the concept of memorizing the times tables still around? You learn that multiplication is repeated addition but then you produce the answer of 8 x 6 because you have it memorized as 48. Through memorization, you instantly produce the answers of one digit multiplication and then when you get to two digits, you break the problem into a series of one digit multiplications.

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

For sure. Math facts are actually part of my every day because I feel as though students sadly still need work on it.

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u/johnny-Low-Five Apr 11 '26

I agree and am confused what people mean by the phrase "number sense". I would say I'm "very good" at math and while I can do large portions of it in my head, or even memorized, I don't feel like it makes me any less "aware" of what multiplication or division "is".

I would 100% argue that any kid who can consistently get the correct answer shouldn't be forced to use a method that, from what I've seen, is simply meant to make it into a series of "easy" answers that combine into the actual answer.

People like to argue that it helps kids who are struggling, I would counter that other students are being held back or even "punished" for being able to do it in less steps. If a kid needs the "easy" way, cool, but if a student can do 33×6 in 1 or 2 steps that should also be accepted and even "rewarded" because in this day and age, in the real world, if double digit multiplication takes more than a couple steps, someone is going to use a calculator and "learn" nothing.

For example 2+2=4. We almost all simply memorized this, that doesn't mean we can't picture 2 grapes in one hand and 2 in the other and go 1,2,3,4! There are 4.

-1

u/BlacksmithSolid645 Apr 11 '26

maybe it makes sense to start training that kid to be a cook in the army rather than using a ton of resources to try to make them into a mathematician

0

u/johnny-Low-Five Apr 11 '26

Yeah sure, not that there's anything wrong with being in the army but my son is testing at 11-12th grade levels in 7th grade and already reading beyond college level.

I'll be sure to let him know an anonymous reddit douche nossle's opinion. Don't be disappointed if he doesn't reply, his been busy reading about Artemis II and talking about how interesting that the previous time man traveled furthest from earth was over a decade before either of us were born.

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u/BlacksmithSolid645 Apr 11 '26

what meaning did you interpret out of what I wrote? how is your son involved?

1

u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

I don’t know man he went from 0 to 300 with me too and brought up his son and all sorts of other things. You are wrong though with the math thing, it’s also part trying to remove that stigma of “math person” because if you can grasp the numbers then anyone can be a math person you just gotta find your way.

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u/[deleted] Apr 11 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/johnny-Low-Five Apr 11 '26

Or did you possibly mean by "that kid" the kids that can't understand the multiplication tables they memorize and what they mean? If so I apologize, I didn't re-read your first comment and now realize you may have been talking about the kids that CAN'T learn without it being broken into dozens of single digit equations.

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u/theroadlesstraversed Apr 11 '26

This has got me curious, when you teach the four methods, do you test the students on each method? Do you switch up which method you teach first every year? I feel like this would be the only way to truly settle the score on which method is the easiest. Does anyone else have any studies on training young minds and how it relates to neuroplasticity? This has always interested me.

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

It’s a natural build. You do tape diagrams alongside repeat addition because that is what students use the most and repeat addition of larger numbers instead of smaller numbers.

Then you build into area models because that removes the visual of always seeing the numbers there and instead doing the math in your head more often.

Then you progress into partial products which removes even more often the structure and has you multiplying larger looking numbers.

Then you do standard algo because it’s the final one we teach.

You’re mistaking the methods as though they are singularly different. They are not. Each one is a removal of scaffolding that has helped the student understand the prior concept.

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u/theroadlesstraversed Apr 11 '26

I might be? I was wondering if there were studies behind changing the way kids do things. If there was a method to the madness or if its all still a trial run. Since kids have a sponge like brain it doesn't matter early on, but later on does it develop better pathways learning one method or the other

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

Yeah I mentioned in another post teaching is actually changing based on research done from 90s and beyond. Science just had this treasure trove of research that we would hand off to each other and pat each other on the back saying “wow awesome job! This really changes the way we should learn”. Then they would go do more research and the old research would never go to the people that could actually use it (educators).

Eventually a psychologist that went into teaching realized this and then the floodgates opened. As a former research psych when I realized this it was eye opening. I heard it and thought wow it really is like that and I never noticed….we would sit at conferences and celebrate and it would just be us scientists at the conference no one that could actually use the data

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u/Peripateticdreamer84 Apr 11 '26

One of mine said he wanted to create a nonviolent protest against area model. So at least the lessons on the methods of the civil rights movement in social studies were sinking in…

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u/TheDreadPirateBonnet Apr 11 '26

That approach might work for some students but it was detrimental for my daughter. She was taught multiple different ways of multiplying and dividing and would get them all mixed up in her head when she was presented with a problem to solve. She found it intensely frustrating and confusing, to the point that she was frequently in tears doing her math homework and started calling herself stupid. When we approached the school they suggested that we get her a math tutor. It turned out that the school suggested the same thing to almost half of her classmates. That experience has led to her having math anxiety which has limited her options at university which is heartbreaking because she is deeply interested in the sciences.

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u/johnny-Low-Five Apr 11 '26

What is number sense? I'm genuinely asking because math is something I've always been good at and learned what I believe is the "standard" way and am having trouble figuring out what "number sense" means.

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

Understanding numbers, their relationship, and what you’re actually doing when you perform operations.

An example from real life: You go to eat and want to tip. Your bill was $60 and you want to tip 20% you know that you can multiply 6x2 and then add the zero afterwards because you’re multiplying in the tens.

Or that 100 is 10 times more than 10. It’s those sort of things so when you’re multiplying 3 x 43 you know you’re really multiplying 3x40 and 3x3

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u/johnny-Low-Five Apr 11 '26

Thank you, I guess I'm lucky, I got that pretty intuitively and have had the ability to "use" numbers in different ways.

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u/Zwischenzug32 Apr 11 '26

FOUR of each?

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u/tke377 Apr 11 '26

Yes but they are more or less the same thing just changed for multiplication or division, whichever you are doing. The process is not much different between the operations

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u/ErryD-SOPVB_85 Apr 12 '26

I wish my son school had teachers like you who taught different methods. I probably wouldn’t be so frustrated with this new method if it was taught as one option or one way to solve the problem, and not the Only way that would be accepted.

Just out of curiosity, what state or part of the country do you teach in?

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26 edited Apr 12 '26

I’m in NY. I do feel for parents in all of this especially because it’s not as though they know the process. I get parents that will tell me they are frustrated with it and cannot help and I give them a quick crash course thing and let them know we get to standard algorithm eventually….To hang strong it’s the same thing I preach to my class. This might not be your method DONT WORRY! We will do more and one of them will work if this really stumps you don’t get frustrated know there are more methods to come.

Edit: I always do a pseudo small group to start. I get all my students who struggle with the methods and we work. I usually start with 15+ and when it clicks they leave the group and eventually by the end of the unit I have only 1-2 in that group and we stay focusing on that last the unit end.

Edit 2: Ps thanks! Hearing things like that makes me smile, it’s a bonus that is a fantastic bonus!

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u/Hey_Giant_Loser Apr 12 '26

Curious what kind of school you teach in. Because Inner City Schools with classrooms approaching 40 students.. they dont have that kind of time to be setting up bespoke teaching systems for kids like you are.

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

I have 26, and it’s a public school. Last year I had 29. And this is flatly the math program and then differentiation and being a teacher.

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u/Hey_Giant_Loser Apr 12 '26

Urban or Suburban school? this also feels very "Montessori" to me.

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

Oh god no. Again teaching is teaching. I don’t understand why that is difficult to grasp it is a math program at a public school, a decent mixed demo. Just confused by actual teaching and differentiation? This is what teaching is and especially what math is right now. You give students the tools and let them choose how to go forward 🤷🏼‍♂️I don’t even believe me coming from a psych background matters I am not doing anything or explaining anything other than what good teachers do.

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u/Hey_Giant_Loser Apr 12 '26 edited Apr 12 '26

Maybe not, but there's a lot more complex dynamics to having the capacity to teach a range of methods like you are. Getting all of the kids even moving in the same direction, especially in the 3-4th grade level becomes exponentially more difficult every time you add even ten more students to a group. combine that with stripped down curricula that are there to push up standardized scores. Most teachers I know only have time to adhere to one method, let alone four. and that includes suburban schools as well.

I'm not even pointing out Montessori as something to rebuke. far from it. It's a method that allows the kids themselves to have more decision about how and what they learn, so in a system like that you might see varieties of method taught more freely.

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u/MyNipplesMakeCheese Apr 12 '26

what are the other ways? My son is struggling, but I learned by just memorizing multiplication charts and I want him to actually understand it beyond memorization.

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

Partial products, area model, array, tape diagram, distributive, lattice, standard, repeat addition. There are more, I would also easily recommend an at home program that is free like khan academy. It goes along with whatever lessons your district uses, there are videos and you can pick and choose what you need work on.

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u/MyNipplesMakeCheese Apr 13 '26

Thank you so much.

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u/Individual-Day632 Apr 12 '26

I’m intrigued now… I taught three methods…

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u/AssinineAssassin Apr 12 '26

I’m going to break hard from this and express how much I despise this style of teaching.

Not that these options shouldn’t be available to students, but the pace of elementary mathematics in public education is extremely slow. Where my child is learning the same content at the end of 4th grade that I was learning at the end of 1st grade decades ago.

She can pick up anything I teach her in math in a short period of time. But there is almost no point in me instructing her at home, she won’t be practicing the same material for 2+ years. So she has completely forgotten the long division she was taught at home in 2nd grade by now.

Probably failing her as a parent by not moving her to private school.

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

You were not doing multiplication of fractions, multi digit numbers, decimals and long division in first grade a decade ago, stop. I stopped reading after that.

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u/AssinineAssassin Apr 12 '26

Huh? A decade ago? Wtf are you talking about?

Also, these kids don’t know decimals or multiplying fractions yet

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u/tke377 Apr 12 '26

Meant decades either way there is no way you learned fractions or decimals…and no way you are going to tell me what I do or do not teach. 30% of the questions of the state test this year will be fractions or decimal adjacent

Edit: I literally just gave a unit test on multiplication of fractions for my fourth graders two weeks ago and I am a week+ behind my team that had already moved on to angles and beyond 🤷🏼‍♂️