What is banned and not banned in Florida

[billvon 2,397]

So in Florida, almost half of the math textbooks available have been banned due to inappropriate content.   So just to use two concrete examples, this is content that Florida now bans:

What?  Me?  Racist?  More than 2 million people have tested their racial prejudice using an online version of the Implicit Association Test.  Most groups' average score fall between "slight" and "moderate" but the differences among groups, by age and political identification, are intriguing.  In this section's Exercise Set (Exercises 103 and 104) you will be working with models that measure that bias: (Polynomials follow)

This is content that Florida finds age-appropriate for grade schoolers:

Moses was angry with the officers of the army, the captains of thousands and the captains of hundreds, who had come from service in the war. And Moses said to them, “Have you spared all the women? Behold, these caused the sons of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to trespass against the Lord in the matter of Peor, so the plague was among the congregation of the Lord. Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known a man intimately. But all the girls who have not known man intimately, spare for yourselves."

 

[Phil1111 910]

5 minutes ago, billvon said:

So in Florida, almost half of the math textbooks available have been banned due to inappropriate content. .... So just to use two concrete examples, this is content that Florida now bans: kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known a man intimately. But all the girls who have not known man intimately, spare for yourselves.".

 

Please quote where you found this. I find it a bit difficult to believe even for America.

[billvon 2,397]

10 minutes ago, Phil1111 said:

Please quote where you found this. I find it a bit difficult to believe even for America.

Old Testament, Numbers 31.

Now just consider what sort of violence we would see from the right if anyone suggested banning the Bible.

[ryoder 1,384]

1 hour ago, billvon said:

Old Testament, Numbers 31.

Now just consider what sort of violence we would see from the right if anyone suggested banning the Bible.

You do know it is already happening, right?

NPR: Florida man asks schools to ban Bible following the state's efforts to remove books

 

[DougH 270]

7 hours ago, ryoder said:

You do know it is already happening, right?

NPR: Florida man asks schools to ban Bible following the state's efforts to remove books

 

Good, religion shouldn't be in public school beyond teaching theology light, that different people have different imaginary friends and that is ok. There isn't really much to teach there because kids inherently understand that, it is the influence of their parents and communities that fuck up that virtue.

Communities and families should teach religion at home and at church, temple, satanic den, etc. All of the above are already subsidized heavily by taxpayers, so it isn't like we aren't already give a massive handout to religions already.

Is the issue that Priests are too busy scamming money and diddling, so they need to outsource teaching basic bible study to public school teachers?

Edited April 27, 2022 by DougH

[metalslug 31]

10 hours ago, billvon said:

Now just consider what sort of violence we would see from the right if anyone suggested banning the Bible.

Are you seriously comparing a mathematics textbook to the Bible in that context?  Surely you would agree that there are many ways to teach mathematics without ever needing to reference scripture or politics or any ideology outside of the pure sciences.  Would you be happier if scripture were allowed in mathematics textbooks?  I have as much contempt  for scripture as you do but by comparison it would seem to absurd to ban scripture from the Bible because the entire book is scripture and it's optional reading as opposed to mandated curriculum.  Seeing the difference? 

[billvon 2,397]

3 minutes ago, metalslug said:

Are you seriously comparing a mathematics textbook to the Bible in that context? 

Absolutely.  The topic is "what is age appropriate" - with the understanding that non-age-appropriate things will be banned.

Quote

 Surely you would agree that there are many ways to teach mathematics without ever needing to reference scripture or politics or any ideology outside of the pure sciences.

Of course.  That was just one of dozens of examples in that book - so that book DOES teach mathematics in all those myriad ways.  Florida lawmakers simply cherrypicked that example.

It should also be noted that that (and one other example) are the only examples they gave of why they were banning those books.  So that was the absolute worst case they could find.

Several papers looked at other books that were banned.  Since Florida is not giving any rationale for why they banned the rest of them, reporters were forced to try to find the worst-case example of something that conservatives would find "woke."  In one case, it was a picture of two kids, with one kid saying "Andy says that he can find 9+5 by starting with 9+1=10.  What do you think about Andy's way?  Show your work and explain."  The second kid says "To learn together, disagree respectfully."

This is really what needs to be banned?  Was it because "disagreeing respectfully" was too woke?  Or was it that the second kid was portrayed as black?

Modern math is taught with relationships to the real world.  In the olden timey days students would be presented with rows of numbers to add or subtract.  Today's examples include things like "Joe wants to buy a book, but it costs $6.00 and he only has $1.25.  He can get a job selling papers door to door for $X an hour, a job shining shoes for $Y an hour, or a job working at a pop up health clinic for $Z an hour.  What is the shortest time he has to work to afford the book?"

Now, conservatives might have you believe that that is "woke libtards shoving vaccinations down kid's throats" or something.  But given that that will be one example among hundreds in that book - that claim is as absurd as their claims from the above book.

 

[SkyDekker 1,122]

38 minutes ago, metalslug said:

Surely you would agree that there are many ways to teach mathematics without ever needing to reference scripture or politics or any ideology outside of the pure sciences.

Sure there are. But, many kids often indicate that they cannot see what they would need math for in real life. There is benefit to using references to examples outside of the "pure sciences" to make math itself more accessible. 

[metalslug 31]

8 minutes ago, billvon said:

Absolutely.  The topic is "what is age appropriate" - with the understanding that non-age-appropriate things will be banned.

OK, you may need to help me here; Is mathematics a mandatory subject for Florida students at any stage in their curriculum?  By comparison; is scripture or religious studies mandatory  for Florida students at any stage in their current curriculum?  Surely you concede that difference is important is determining what to ban?

11 minutes ago, billvon said:

This is really what needs to be banned?  Was it because "disagreeing respectfully" was too woke?  Or was it that the second kid was portrayed as black?

Why would a mathematics textbook need to introduce that context at all?  Why does it require visual cartoons? Is it relevant to the mathematical problem as to what race the characters are?  The "Joe wants to buy a book..."  scenario would seem perfectly adequate, the reader is free to make their own (imagined) determinations as to the race or even the gender of 'Joe', if they somehow felt that it was relevant to the mathematical solution.

"Disagree respectfully"?  Certainly that's a fine attitude to have, but it has no place in a mathematics textbook, so why introduce it in the content?   If Florida had accepted a mathematics textbook containing visual cartoons of exclusively white males they would get absolutely panned for that, so leave them all out I say.

[JoeWeber 2,299]

12 hours ago, billvon said:

So in Florida, almost half of the math textbooks available have been banned due to inappropriate content.   So just to use two concrete examples, this is content that Florida now bans:

What?  Me?  Racist?  More than 2 million people have tested their racial prejudice using an online version of the Implicit Association Test.  Most groups' average score fall between "slight" and "moderate" but the differences among groups, by age and political identification, are intriguing.  In this section's Exercise Set (Exercises 103 and 104) you will be working with models that measure that bias: (Polynomials follow)

This is content that Florida finds age-appropriate for grade schoolers:

Moses was angry with the officers of the army, the captains of thousands and the captains of hundreds, who had come from service in the war. And Moses said to them, “Have you spared all the women? Behold, these caused the sons of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to trespass against the Lord in the matter of Peor, so the plague was among the congregation of the Lord. Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known a man intimatels ballet ly. But all the girls who have not known man intimately, spare for yourselves."

 

It's like this: 2+2 equals TuTu. That's what is going on in math and that's what needs to be stopped: they want boys to wear girls ballet clothes. 

[jakee 1,254]

3 minutes ago, metalslug said:

Why would a mathematics textbook need to introduce that context at all?  Why does it require visual cartoons? Is it relevant to the mathematical problem as to what race the characters are?  The "Joe wants to buy a book..."  scenario would seem perfectly adequate, the reader is free to make their own (imagined) determinations as to the race or even the gender of 'Joe', if they somehow felt that it was relevant to the mathematical solution.

Are you fucking kidding me?

Let’s assume for just a moment that respectable, long established textbook companies might have some small inkling of how children learn and what helps them retain information. 
 

Then, let’s look at the problem from the other side and ask you to explain what could possibly be wrong with having cartoons of children who are not exclusively white in a school book. If you can do that without reference to right wing snowflakes who literally cannot deal with acknowledging that non-white people exist that’d be great.

[billvon 2,397]

2 minutes ago, metalslug said:

OK, you may need to help me here; Is mathematics a mandatory subject for Florida students at any stage in their curriculum?  By comparison; is scripture or religious studies mandatory  for Florida students at any stage in their current curriculum?  Surely you concede that difference is important is determining what to ban?

I think the fact that you have accepted that we have to ban books, and now are just determining which of them to ban, is somewhat sad.

But yes, math is required and religious studies are not.  And also yes, required curriculum is (and should be) under more scrutiny.

But again, saying that a math book that suggests you disagree respectfully must be banned, and an optional book that calls out who to rape is OK for grade school kids - that's fucked up.  Even if the math book is under more scrutiny.

And keep in mind that conservatives aren't just banning curriculum-central texts.  They are also banning whole lists of optional books that simply present a non-conservative perspective.  Given that, it's pretty clear that their bans on math books aren't some innocent attempt to make math more pure.  It is to ensure that the only ideologies taught by math textbooks are conservative ones.

Quote

Why would a mathematics textbook need to introduce that context at all?

Because the previous sentence asked what they thought about another person's way to do a math problem.  And saying "Andy is an idiot" is not an appropriate response.

Quote

 Why does it require visual cartoons?

To be clear - you are asking why grade school math books use cartoons?  They've been using them for 50 years to better engage with students.  They use them because they work; studies have shown that visual material often keeps kid's attention for longer and enables them to learn visually as well as analytically.

Quote

The "Joe wants to buy a book..."  scenario would seem perfectly adequate

Until a conservative decides that working at a clinic is ramming vaccinations down kid's throats.

[metalslug 31]

3 minutes ago, jakee said:

Let’s assume for just a moment that respectable, long established textbook companies might have some small inkling of how children learn and what helps them retain information. 

Yet books exist from respectable companies that don't have that content, possibly one's now adopted by Florida. Will this mean that Florida students will be incapable of learning mathematics without the banned content?  Time will tell, I suppose, but I doubt it.

[wmw999 2,121]

27 minutes ago, metalslug said:

Yet books exist from respectable companies that don't have that content, possibly one's now adopted by Florida. Will this mean that Florida students will be incapable of learning mathematics without the banned content?  Time will tell, I suppose, but I doubt it.

They do. But if those books don't do as good a job of engaging students, then they're not the best choice. As a rule, local school districts have a better handle on their students than a statewide authority. 

Wendy P. 

[jakee 1,254]

45 minutes ago, metalslug said:

Yet books exist from respectable companies that don't have that content, possibly one's now adopted by Florida. Will this mean that Florida students will be incapable of learning mathematics without the banned content?  Time will tell, I suppose, but I doubt it.

Does it mean they'll all learn quite as well?

Now, do you actually want to try and provide any positive justification for this very expensive action by the Florida state which removes freedom of choice from schools and parents? Again, as far as I can see the only reason for it is a bunch of snowflakes forcing way OTT political correctness on the education system. 

[billvon 2,397]

23 minutes ago, wmw999 said:

They do. But if those books don't do as good a job of engaging students, then they're not the best choice. As a rule, local school districts have a better handle on their students than a statewide authority. 

I do note that most conservatives are quite staunchly anti-large-government - unless that government is banning things that they don't like, like gay marriage, interracial marriage, certain books, abortion or studies of structural racism in America.  Then government can't be big or powerful enough.

[JerryBaumchen 1,048]

1 hour ago, billvon said:

I think the fact that you have accepted that we have to ban books, and now are just determining which of them to ban, is somewhat sad.

But yes, math is required and religious studies are not.  And also yes, required curriculum is (and should be) under more scrutiny.

But again, saying that a math book that suggests you disagree respectfully must be banned, and an optional book that calls out who to rape is OK for grade school kids - that's fucked up.  Even if the math book is under more scrutiny.

And keep in mind that conservatives aren't just banning curriculum-central texts.  They are also banning whole lists of optional books that simply present a non-conservative perspective.  Given that, it's pretty clear that their bans on math books aren't some innocent attempt to make math more pure.  It is to ensure that the only ideologies taught by math textbooks are conservative ones.

Because the previous sentence asked what they thought about another person's way to do a math problem.  And saying "Andy is an idiot" is not an appropriate response.

To be clear - you are asking why grade school math books use cartoons?  They've been using them for 50 years to better engage with students.  They use them because they work; studies have shown that visual material often keeps kid's attention for longer and enables them to learn visually as well as analytically.

Until a conservative decides that working at a clinic is ramming vaccinations down kid's throats.

Hi Bill,

Re:  you are asking why grade school math books use cartoons?  They've been using them for 50 years to better engage with students.  They use them because they work; studies have shown that visual material often keeps kid's attention for longer 

Reminds me of how they had to present the President's Daily Briefing during the Trump admin.

Jerry Baumchen

[ryoder 1,384]

4 minutes ago, JerryBaumchen said:

Hi Bill,

Re:  you are asking why grade school math books use cartoons?  They've been using them for 50 years to better engage with students.  They use them because they work; studies have shown that visual material often keeps kid's attention for longer 

Reminds me of how they had to present the President's Daily Briefing during the Trump admin.

Jerry Baumchen

I was thinking the same thing.

[JerryBaumchen 1,048]

2 minutes ago, ryoder said:

I was thinking the same thing.

Hi Robert,

That old saying:  Like minds think alike.

Jerry Baumchen

[Phil1111 910]

1 hour ago, billvon said:

I do note that most conservatives are quite staunchly anti-large-government - unless that government is banning things that they don't like, like gay marriage, interracial marriage, certain books, abortion or studies of structural racism in America.  Then government can't be big or powerful enough.

Y'all forgot steering contracts to Bubba, the brother of a GOP insider. Bailing out identifiable constituents with government subsidies.Redrawing districts, stacking courts, etc.

GOP trying to make America's corruption ranking beat Russia's. By one place.

Below the trump years and the US corruption index.

[riggerrob 558]

On 4/27/2022 at 10:57 AM, JerryBaumchen said:

Hi Bill,

Re:  you are asking why grade school math books use cartoons?  They've been using them for 50 years to better engage with students.  They use them because they work; studies have shown that visual material often keeps kid's attention for longer 

Reminds me of how they had to present the President's Daily Briefing during the Trump admin.

Jerry Baumchen

Some students are auditory learners. 

Some students are visual learners.

Some students are tactile learners.

Some students learn form smell ... go ask your dog ... Hah! Hah!

Some students learn best when they read instructions.

Some students learn better from static diagrams.

Some students learn better from cartoons.

Some students learn better from photographs.

Some students learn better from maps, while others are totally baffled by maps.

Some students learn best from videos.

I can only do math when I see numbers written on a page.

All students only truly learn after they have practiced the new skill a few times.

Bottom line, you probably have students with a half-dozen learning styles and the more different ways you present the material, the better your chances of catching the attention of every student.

[ryoder 1,384]

2 minutes ago, riggerrob said:

Some students are auditory learners. 

Some students are visual learners.

Some students are tactile learners.

Some students learn form smell ... go ask your dog ... Hah! Hah!

Some students learn best when they read instructions.

Some students learn better from static diagrams.

Some students learn better from cartoons.

Some students learn better from photographs.

Some students learn better from maps, while others are totally baffled by maps.

Some students learn best from videos.

I can only do math when I see numbers written on a page.

All students only truly learn after they have practiced the new skill a few times.

Bottom line, you probably have students with a half-dozen learning styles and the more different ways you present the material, the better your chances of catching the attention of every student.

In college, I had a next-door neighbor in the dorm who was working on his PhD in Electrical Engineering. Part of his duties was teaching undergrads, and he was keenly interested in differences in how people learned. For this reason, he made each exam totally different. It drove some of his students nuts because the style of the next exam was never predictable. LOL!

One of the exam methods he came up with was quite novel: He gave a lecture on material already covered, with errors sprinkled in. The responsibilities of the students were to listen, and take notes of every error he made, then hand in their notes at the end of the lecture. The exam scored was based on the number of errors accurately noted.

[wmw999 2,121]

That's an awesome test. 

Wendy P. 

[billvon 2,397]

3 hours ago, ryoder said:

One of the exam methods he came up with was quite novel: He gave a lecture on material already covered, with errors sprinkled in. The responsibilities of the students were to listen, and take notes of every error he made, then hand in their notes at the end of the lecture. The exam scored was based on the number of errors accurately noted.

I started doing the same thing with design reviews.  I'd purposely put 2-3 errors in a schematic and then give people something minor (a $10 gift card to Friday's or something) if they found any errors.  Once they started looking that hard, they'd find the unintentional errors as well.

[wmw999 2,121]

They tried that at Shuttle (obviously awhile ago), and found that too many programmers were quitting when they found all the introduced errors. So instead we had a different group entirely do the testing, and they only tested the code once the coders (my group) thought it was complete. They did participate in inspections, and were honest about finding code errors that they could have been rewarded for finding via test once released. Which was a good thing -- code is rarely perfect, and this was all hand-coded.

The job wasn't a great fit for me in some ways (I'm much more loosey-goosey and not perfection-driven), but it was a group and project I was proud to be associated with. 

Wendy P.