Math books banned for Critical Race Theory

[TGLS]

To me this is a sign that things are getting out of hand. I mean what does Critical Race Theory have to do with math? Or has 2+2=4 become political now?

The best I can come up with is people objecting to word problems that go, "Tariq and Zoya are dividing up apples..."

Or it's just graft and this is the excuse.

[phantom000]

To me this is a sign that things are getting out of hand. I mean what does Critical Race Theory have to do with math? Or has 2+2=4 become political now?

The best I can come up with is people objecting to word problems that go, "Tariq and Zoya are dividing up apples..."

Or it's just graft and this is the excuse.

Probably. To me this feels more like people screaming at each other to prove who's 'the bigger man around here.' And I have much better things to do than to get involved in a 'sword measuring contest' like finishing that floating castle in Minecraft Creative mode.

[Frustration]

We really can't reach any conclusions until we see the supposedly-objectionable content.

[TGLS]

Well they found two examples: https://www.fldoe.org/academics/standar ... materials/

The first is apparently being upset that the data used for one question in a unit on polynomials concerns bias survey (presumably this is the so-called "CRT" question).

The second is a note about social and emotional learning being included in a math textbook. Neither of the two images explain what social and emotional learning is, and it was already clear that this was grounds for a book to be cut over.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

We really can't reach any conclusions until we see the supposedly-objectionable content.

Oh COME ON. Yes we can!
Critical Race Theory is one, specific, college-level subject. It can't fit in a math textbook. They are WITHHOLDING information because they know that any reasonable person would see it's not critical race theory.

This government censorship, a war on critical thinking and education threatening to their agendas.

[phantom000]

Well they found two examples: https://www.fldoe.org/academics/standar ... materials/

The first is apparently being upset that the data used for one question in a unit on polynomials concerns bias survey (presumably this is the so-called "CRT" question).

The second is a note about social and emotional learning being included in a math textbook. Neither of the two images explain what social and emotional learning is, and it was already clear that this was grounds for a book to be cut over.

There is a lot to unpack here but this is my input.

I understand the importance of social and emotional learning, but I think that would come mostly from the classroom environment, as in from their fellow students and instructors. I seriously doubt how much SEL a student would learn from a text book.

Also, this is a math book! If it was just one or two places I would be inclined not to care, but the page mentions that these are not an exhaustive list which suggests that such things are found throughout the text book. Back before Covid, my nephew had a science teacher, a science teacher! who started her classes by ranting about whatever Trump supposedly did that week. Now, I never liked Trump as president and feel like his campaign was publicity student that got way out of hand, but that has no place in a class room, especially in an elementary science class. A teacher should always be professional so as to focus on the subject and so anyone creating a text book should have a similar attitude. If this was a text book about American society and focusing on how these issues have shifted over the years I would not argue but trying to stuff these into a mathematics book feels very unprofessional to me.

And to the department's credit they seem to be working with the publisher to address the issues rather than just flat out banning the book.

[TGLS]

I understand the importance of social and emotional learning, but I think that would come mostly from the classroom environment, as in from their fellow students and instructors. I seriously doubt how much SEL a student would learn from a text book.

Also, this is a math book! If it was just one or two places I would be inclined not to care, but the page mentions that these are not an exhaustive list which suggests that such things are found throughout the text book.

Well two points:
I still don't understand what's so objectionable about SEL that textbooks that include SEL related material need to be refused as a valid textbook. When I was in elementary and secondary school, I remember that entire units were skipped over, not just individual lessons. Somebody had to write the SEL pages, and they probably take up more space, so either the book is thicker and more expensive, or the book has less math content, or something. If the material isn't flatly objectionable, let the school boards decide whether or not they want to buy a textbook with wasted pages.

This isn't one math book, this is 54 math books. 28 were rejected for prohibited topics and unsolicited strategies (i.e. "CRT", SEL & Common Core). 12 were rejected for not meeting state standards. 14 were rejected because of both. Not an exhaustive list could mean:
-> In that textbook that had the data taken from some survey about bias, there was a question that related to race or whatever in every lesson.
-> In that textbook that had the data taken from some survey about bias, those were the only two questions in the entire textbook, and that was enough to warrant rejection.

How many of the 54 textbooks were taken out because of each topic? Unclear, but no more than 42. The government of Florida may be posturing for their base and only rejected a few textbooks over "CRT", or there may have been many and the press release was correct to highlight "CRT".

[hammerofglass]

If a student gets to polynomials and anything in those examples is new to them the social studies program has already failed them completely and utterly. It's basic stuff.

[Frustration]

It's the American educational system. Foreign students involved in student-exchange programs don't get any credit for the year they're in America. That's how bad our schools are by international standards.

My high school German teacher, Frau Cotter, was great. But she had a hard time at first, because she didn't realize that no one in the class knew what a noun case was. It had never been covered in our English classes. Said class included multiple honors and G&T students - none of us had ever heard of the concept.

[TGLS]

My high school German teacher, Frau Cotter, was great. But she had a hard time at first, because she didn't realize that no one in the class knew what a noun case was. It had never been covered in our English classes. Said class included multiple honors and G&T students - none of us had ever heard of the concept.

That's not surprising, noun case barely exists in English anymore. There's personal pronouns, apostrophe s, and that's about it.