This Year 1 Maths Problem Has Parents Scratching Their Heads Over The Correct Answer
Have you heard of this "new maths" method?
By Laila Zain — 16 Feb 2024, 03:57 PM
A Year One maths problem has gone viral online, leaving social media users frustrated at the correct answer
Tiesha Sanders, a mother from Texas, USA, shared a photo of her daughter's Year One maths homework on her Facebook account.
The homework instructions read, "Fill in the missing numbers."
The given number was 27. From there, an arrow points to a box that separates "tens" and "ones". Sanders' daughter, Summer, had written "2" under the "tens" column and "7" under the "ones" column.
The final part of the question includes a blank space followed by the word "ones", which the first-grader filled in with "7".
Summer was consequently marked incorrect for her answer of "7 ones".
Confused about why her daughter's answer was marked as incorrect, Tiesha left a note for the teacher at the bottom of the homework assignment
"Hello! I just wanted to ask how Summer got #3 wrong? Her father and I were going over her mistakes and wanted to be sure we were on the right track," Tiesha wrote.
To which the teacher replied, "Hello, this is the new math they have us teaching", followed by the correct answer that shows "27 ones".
"It wants her to know that having 2 tens and 7 ones is the same as 27 ones," the teacher goes on to write.
Sharing the photo of the homework on Facebook, Tiesha wrote that she was a primary school teacher for six years and had never come across maths taught with this method
"The new Math is NOT IT!" she captioned her post.
She goes on to say that she is not upset with the teacher as she understands that she's just doing her job, but that the "new math" is frustrating for Year One students.
The post has since gone viral with over 4,700 comments and 19,000 shares
Commenters have weighed in on the issue and many agree with the mum.
Meanwhile, some teachers have also left comments, agreeing that the "new maths" method is just as confusing for them
Others came up with better ways to phrase the question, while some felt the answer was already obvious
What do you think? Would you have answered "27 ones" or "7 ones"?
Here's the original Facebook post:
