Every time I run into one of these examples, I just cringe. I want the progenitors of Common Core Math to sit for a solid 6 months doing nothing but examples like this all day long.
“Might not be comfortable thinking about 9 + 6. is. They are quite comfortable thinking about their friend 10. 10 is emphasized in our young grades as we are working in a base-10 system. So if we can partner 9 to a number and anchor 10, we can help our students see what 9 plus 6 is. So, we are going to decompose our 6 and we know 6 is made up of parts. One of its parts is a 1 and the other part is a 5. We are now going to anchor our 9 to a 1, allowing our students to anchor to that 10. Now our students are seeing that we have 10 plus 5. Having them now more comfort seeing that 10 plus 5 is 15. That is much more comfortable than looking at 9 plus 6, an isolated math fact”
Stupid, stupid, stupid! This is NOT going to teach the kids anything – bring back the flash cards and memorization tables. Get the fundamental knowledgebase built up FIRST, then worry about the Critical Thinking part later. Critical thinking requires that one knows facts; otherwise, you just should sit in the corner and dribble.
(H/T: The Blaze)