The Children of River Dell deserve a Quality Math Education !

To:  The Oradell, River Edge, and River Dell Boards of Education:

For the benefit of our children, our school district, and our community, we the undersigned residents of the Oradell, River Edge, and River Dell School Districts do hereby affirm our opposition to the continuation of the “Everyday Math” curriculum in our respective School Districts and any new implementation of a reform/fuzzy math program for grades K-12.

We assert that Reform Math curriculum is:

• Poorly presented through a fast-moving spiral approach
• Introduces far too many concepts with little depth
• Deemphasizes practice and mastery of basic fundamental skills
• Does not teach highly reliable and standard algorithms for multiplication and division
• Does not encourage mastery of basic math facts and computational skills
• Under develops multiplication number fact automaticity
• Introduces multiple methods for solving problems before requiring mastery and proficiency in any particular method causing confusion for students
• Encourages calculator use beginning in kindergarten in addition to creating an overdependence on other “crutches” such as number grids and fraction bars
• Is jeopardizing the ability of our children to succeed mathematically at higher grade levels
• Is not appropriate as the stand-alone/core Mathematics curriculum.

We the undersigned specifically request the following three actions be taken by our respective School Districts:

1. Discontinue the use of “Everyday Math” as the primary mathematics curriculum in grades K-5 beyond the current 2008-2009 school year.
2. Establish a formal Board of Education resolution to adopt and implement a nationally accepted and published balanced mathematics curriculum for the 2009-2010 school year before June 30, 2009.
3. Establish an appropriate budgetary appropriation for the 2009-2010 school year for the adoption of a nationally accepted and published balanced mathematics curriculum prior to the budget adoption deadline in 2009.

We support the continued excellence of our dedicated educational staff and seek to have a cooperative environment, inclusive of parents, to implement a balanced mathematics curriculum within a reasonable time period.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

The The Children of River Dell deserve a Quality Math Education ! Petition to The Oradell, River Edge, and River Dell Boards of Education: was created by Oradell and River Dell and written by renata pestic (qualitymathchildren@yahoo.com).  This petition is hosted here at www.PetitionOnline.com as a public service. There is no endorsement of this petition, express or implied, by Artifice, Inc. or our sponsors. For technical support please use our simple Petition Help form.