Warren: The state of math education is dire. I help my own kids (10, 12)

with their math homework as best I can, but often the questions are

ambiguous or actually incomprehensible. The approved answers, when we get

them, are often mysterious, and sometimes wrong.

There is, as someone pointed out a while ago, no royal road to math. It’s mud and stones all the

way. The only way to get good at it is to do endless repetitive drills

until they become second nature, then advance to the next level and repeat

the process. A great deal of stuff has to be MEMORIZED. That, of course,

goes against the whole grain of modern educational practice (and theory).

I’m thinking of getting one of the old school textbooks — Hall & Knight,

perhaps — and just flogging my kids

through it. All the modern textbooks I’ve seen are useless.