“Who's counting? It was, of course, the minority who were counting. It always is. Most of the women I know today would dearly like to use their fingers and toes for some activity more enthralling than counting. They have been counting for so long. But the peculiar problem of the new math is that every time we stop adding, somebody starts subtracting. At the very least (the advanced students will understand this) the rate of increase slows. ... The minority members of any group or profession have two answers: They can keep score or they can lose.” KnowsLongHas BeensTwoUseProblemTodayCoursesLosesAnswersGroupsStudentsActivityMembersRacismIncreaseFingersRateMathProfessionDiscriminationInequalityScoreMinoritiesPeculiarToesCountingFingers And Toes Book:Making Sense Source: Making Sense
“Take a random group of 8-year-old American and Japanese kids, give them all a really, really hard math problem, and start a stopwatch. The American kids will give up after 30, 40 seconds. If you let the test run for 15 minutes, the Japanese kids will not have given up. You have to take it away.” IfsGivingYearsHardProblemRunningKidsGivenGroupsMinutesGiving UpTestsMathSecondsGiven UpMath Problems Author:Malcolm Gladwell