Innovative math program adds up for St. Louis students

ST. LOUIS -- It's math time and, for City Academy third-graders Michael Shaw and Laila Elliott, that adds up to one thing: It's time to hit the deck.

Or floor, as the case may be, an array of blocks, beads and numbers -- not a math book in sight -- spread out before them.

This is not their parents' math. Unless, of course, their parents were educated in Singapore, the nation that has given its name to the acclaimed teaching method that vaulted the tiny Asian island to the top of the mathematics world.

City Academy, the private school that targets disadvantaged students, introduced the program this year. It is already reaping the benefits of the switch from the way math is traditionally taught in the United States.

Dramatic improvement

In the third grade, math lessons that last year consumed an entire semester are now understood within a month. The credit, said teacher Meghan Taylor, goes to a teaching program that emphasizes the use of physical objects over the tradition of teaching math by memorization, recitation and review.

Down the hall, John Becker, a math specialist, has immersed his sixth-graders in algebraic problems normally found in advanced high school classes.

"The beauty of this approach is that it allows [the students] to do things in a way they've never seen before," said Becker, a former engineer, who combines the Singapore program with a Japanese method of teaching math.

"They figure it out on their own, and that's inventive thinking."

It also means that not only are the City Academy children learning, they're also enjoying it to the point they're begging for more. "Our math classes last an hour," principal Kelly Tyson said. "When we tell them it's over, they say, 'No, I'm not finished.'"

Tyson, a former math teacher in her second year as principal, imported the Singapore program -- which she'd observed while studying in Japan on a Fulbright Scholarship -- to bolster the Academy's plummeting math scores on standardized tests.

Founded in 1999, City Academy has 125 students, all on needs-based scholarships. It is one of the few schools in the region to offer the Singapore math program.

A different approach

In the manner of the ancient abacus, Singapore math employs a system of blocks and beads to form a learning foundation that begins with basic arithmetic and stretches to advanced algebra. At City Academy, books are used to supplement, rather than to drive the learning. In the lower grades, where math problems are solved by children sprawled on the floor, desks are superfluous.

"It's not about the answer, it's about the thinking that goes into it," Tyson said. "A lot of time in the U.S., kids don't care if it's right or wrong. They just want the right answer. This teaches American kids how to get there."

On the floor of a library converted into a math center, Laila and Michael demonstrated their grasp of long division, a lesson that last year took Taylor months to convey.

"We take the golden beads and the blocks first and make the problem," Michael said. The Singapore program encourages students, working in teams of two, to formulate and then answer problems of their own making. Laila and Michael chose 3,589 divided by two.

Blocks were removed, beads carefully separated and counted. "One thousand seven hundred ninety-four, remainder one!" Laila exclaimed, as Michael wrote the answer in a notebook. From start to finish, the entire equation took them under a minute.

Evidence of the students' ability to retain their lessons once they are weaned from the physical learning materials can be found in Singapore, which has finished first in the world in math proficiency in the last three rounds of testing by the Trends In International Mathematics and Science Studies.

Taylor initially balked at the idea of teaching math unconventionally (at least in this country) that required eight hours of preliminary training and refresher courses once a week.

Helping teachers adapt to a style of math learning that runs counter to tradition is the key to the program bridging the divide between Singapore and the United States, said Felix Browder, a mathematics professor at Rutgers University and the recipient of the National Medal of Science.

"Teachers are not used to teaching (math) at this precise a level," said Browder, who gives the Singapore method high marks.

After seeing the results after just a single semester of teaching at that level, Taylor is not only a convert, she is a Singapore program acolyte.

"It's not just a drill now, they actually do retain it," she said. "We move a little slower at the start, but they're progressing faster because we're not just trying to get through a workbook by a specific date."

Though it often seems like the distant past, Laila's memories of second grade remain vivid.

Math, back then, involved textbooks, workbooks and lectures -- all delivered as she sat at a desk.

As Michael waited patiently for her to set up a new problem, she gripped a block fashioned of plastic gold and considered her math lessons of yesteryear.

"Now," she said, "it's funner."