Wednesday, December 13, 2000

By AMY RILEY
One Citizen's Perspective

As many of you may already know, the Fayette County school system is in the process of reviewing textbooks for the upcoming math textbook adoption cycle. It is expected that the final selections will be presented to the board in late January.

Following the recommendation, the textbooks will be displayed for 30 days at the Fayette County Board of Education office for the general public to view and make comments. The Board of Education will likely vote at the regular board meeting in February, and preparations will be made to have the new math textbooks in county schools by August 2001.

In accordance with the Georgia Department of Education cycle for textbook review, whatever is selected will be with us for the next seven years. With that in mind, elementary parents have a unique and invaluable opportunity for the next month to play a significant role in the adoption process.

I encourage you to go to your child's school and look at the four choices for math textbooks currently on display there. Following your observations, you will be allowed to fill out an evaluation form and actually have a voice in your individual school vote.

The four textbook choices currently being considered have been narrowed from a field of 10. The four still in the running are "Everyday Mathematics" (Everyday Learning Corporation); "Math Advantage" (Harcourt Brace); "Math In My World" (McGraw-Hill); and "Mathematics" (Silver Burdett Ginn). "Everyday Mathematics" is the elementary math program currently in use in the Fayette schools for grades one through five.

I will take a moment to disclose to readers that, yes, I was the parent who led the charge three years ago against the adopted math program "Everyday Mathematics," and my opinion has not changed. I don't tell you that to convince you one way or the other. I tell you that because I would be remiss if I didn't.

What have I learned in the past three years? Timing is everything. It is very difficult for all concerned to discover that you may have problems with a program after it is already in place. To be at ground zero during the selection process is an enormous opportunity for parents and teachers alike.

I am not interested in swaying your views for or against a particular program. I'm no more or less qualified to consider textbooks than anyone else. In weighing public opinion over two years ago, for every parent or teacher who didn't care for "Everyday Mathematics," there was another parent or teacher who loved it. (It's a little like our efforts to choose a president.)

What I do want to do is to inspire you to get involved, look at each of the four programs, consider your past experiences with our existing program (since it is still in the running), consider what the other programs may have to offer, and vote for your choice for our upcoming math textbook adoption.

There are a few websites that may help you as you gather information and formulate your own opinions. As you probably know, this country has been steeped in a philosophical difference of opinion on the best way to teach children mathematics for about the last 10 years. What has come to be known as the Math Wars is still an open dispute, with no clear, decisive answers on the horizon.

The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) is the authority for math educators and sets the pace for math instruction in this country. Their standards, which represent the benchmarks for state and county standards in all 50 states, can be found at: http://www.nctm.org/.

The Georgia Department of Education Quality Core Curriculum site can be accessed at http://www.doe.k12.ga.us/informationresources/qcc.html. The Georgia Quality Core Curriculum offers a glimpse, grade by grade, subject by subject, of what every student should know at the end of each school year.

Another site, Mathematically Correct, is rich source of background information on the current debate on math education. This site can be found at http://www.mathematicallycorrect.com.

Within the MathematicallyCorrect site are sites which contain reviews of various math textbooks. One site contains a review of all four of our textbook contenders, written by the same set of reviewers using the same set of reviewing criteria for each. This is an excellent source for parents who would like to do a little homework before they evaluate the books within the schools. The reviews can be accessed at: http://www.mathematicallycorrect.com/books.htm. This site is especially helpful in enabling parents to look at how a program performs across grade levels.

Remember that textbooks are a tool for teaching children. The curriculum outlines what should be taught and when, and the choice of textbook should be the one that most closely meets the requirements of the state and county curriculum for math.

Contact your local school to find out where the books have been placed and when you can come in to evaluate the programs. Each parent vote within a single school will be considered along with the teacher votes to produce one overall vote for that particular school. Each school vote will be added to the individual votes which will be cast by members of the textbook adoption committee. The last day for parent input is Jan. 17, 2001.

(Your comments are welcome: ARileyFreePress@aol.com.)

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