scott wrote:

> I think this was the case in the UK too, my maths teacher mentioned it 
> as something they had to do "in the old days", but it certainly wasn't 
> on the curriculum.  Of course long multiplication and long division 
> were, also later on in school we had to do long division with algebraic 
> expressions... fun!

I envy schools where they actually *teach* algebra.

Everything I know about algebra is what little I've been able to figure 
out for myself and scrape out of library books.

> "Those that can't do, teach, and those that can't teach... teach gym."

Incidentally, our gym teacher was the most terrifying guy in the school. 
Very fair, but... DO NOT get caught doing bad stuff! My God, the horror...

> What makes it worse in the UK is that every year the media congratulates 
> everyone with record pass rates for school exams.

What happens is that every single year, the pass rate either goes up, or 
it goes down. It is a statistical fact that it is almost impossible for 
the pass rate to remain exactly the same.

If it goes up, even slightly, even by a statistically insignificant 
amount, the media starts screaming about "exams are getting too easy". 
Not, you know, that students are getting brighter or working harder or 
new teaching methods or anything like that. No, exams are getting easier.

If it goes down, even by a statistically insignificant amount, the media 
shrieks "schools are failing our children". Not, you know, that the 
exams are getting harder, or that this was just a random fluctuation, 
but that schools are failing us.

No matter what happens, the media will yell and shout about the terrible 
moral decay of either failing schools or watered down exams. There is 
apparently nothing the education system can do about this.

> You simply have to 
> compare a maths exam paper (or even text book) with one from 20 years 
> ago to realise how massively easier it is today.

I haven't had the opportunity to try that, so I really couldn't say.

When I did my exams, I didn't think they were especially easy. And I was 
entered for the lower grades. (E.g., I got a B in science, and B is the 
highest possible mark for the paper I took.)

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