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2202 andrew gelman stats-2014-02-07-Outrage of the week


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Introduction: Mark Palko passes this one along from high school principal Carol Burris: My music teacher, Doreen, brought me her second-grade daughter’s math homework. She was already fuming over Education Secretary Arne Duncan ’s remark about why “white suburban moms” oppose the Common Core, and the homework added fuel to the fire. The problem that disturbed her the most was the following: 3. Sally did some counting. Look at her work. Explain why you think Sally counted this way. 177, 178, 179, 180, 190, 200, 210, 211, 212, 213, 214. It was on a homework sheet from the New York State Common Core Mathematics Curriculum for Grade 2, which you can find here . Doreen’s daughter had no idea how to answer this odd question. I’m with Doreen’s daughter on this one. Actually, it’s worse than that. I clicked on the link, searched on *Sally* to check that the problem was really there as stated, then I looked at the two previous problems: I can’t be sure of the answer to either of


Summary: the most important sentenses genereted by tfidf model

sentIndex sentText sentNum sentScore

1 Mark Palko passes this one along from high school principal Carol Burris: My music teacher, Doreen, brought me her second-grade daughter’s math homework. [sent-1, score-0.367]

2 She was already fuming over Education Secretary Arne Duncan ’s remark about why “white suburban moms” oppose the Common Core, and the homework added fuel to the fire. [sent-2, score-0.387]

3 The problem that disturbed her the most was the following: 3. [sent-3, score-0.149]

4 It was on a homework sheet from the New York State Common Core Mathematics Curriculum for Grade 2, which you can find here . [sent-8, score-0.221]

5 Doreen’s daughter had no idea how to answer this odd question. [sent-9, score-0.433]

6 I clicked on the link, searched on *Sally* to check that the problem was really there as stated, then I looked at the two previous problems: I can’t be sure of the answer to either of these! [sent-12, score-0.434]

7 So I’d say 40 ones = 4 tens, and 40 stars in all. [sent-14, score-0.306]

8 It seems a bit tricky to ask me to write “40″ twice. [sent-16, score-0.07]

9 But they can’t really be asking me to answer “1. [sent-19, score-0.27]

10 It also just seems weird for them to be asking me to count to 14? [sent-21, score-0.255]

11 I had to count a second time just to make sure I didn’t mess up somewhere. [sent-22, score-0.275]

12 That can’t be the skill they want to be teaching. [sent-23, score-0.072]

13 after struggling with all the problems on this page, I figured out the answer they wanted for the “Sally” problem: They want me to say that she is counting from 177 to 214 using tens and ones! [sent-27, score-0.69]

14 This relates to Burris’s other comment: The teachers in her daughter’s school are also concerned. [sent-29, score-0.143]

15 They are startled to find that the curriculum is often a script. [sent-30, score-0.251]

16 Here is an excerpt to teach students to add using beads from the first-grade module. [sent-31, score-0.088]

17 So in some way we should be giving the people on these committees a break. [sent-36, score-0.079]

18 But they have power, they waste a lot of people’s time, so when they do things wrong, I do think the right solution is to mock and mock, scream and scream. [sent-37, score-0.294]


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wordName wordTfidf (topN-words)

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