Part 1: Overview

John Saxon's Story, a genius of common sense in math education, is an original biography of John Saxon's personal life and battles with America's math education leadership. His drive to change math education touched millions of lives after he published his first algebra book in 1981. Because of Saxon Publishers' success with K-12 teaching materials, in spite of the leadership's efforts to destroy him, it was bought in 2004, eight years after his death, for a reported $100 million.

Purchased by an opponent who had despised him, the new owner's sales representatives to this day are not allowed to talk about him as the company's founder and author of his uniquely designed high school textbooks. They even refused to read a chapter from the manuscript prior to the book's publication.

More than half of the 1.5 million homeschooled students use Saxon's traditionally-based products today. His material is found most often in charter and private schools as well as in some small public school districts. Urban districts won't touch Saxon Math because the national and state math education leadership controls urban schools' administrators and teachers. The leaders' hatred and ridicule of his philosophy is still strong 15 years after his death. He did make an impression upon them.

This biography was written to honor John Saxon's work and to promote his philosophical ideas. A good friend of Jaime Escalante, the calculus teacher made famous by the movie Stand and Deliver, Saxon's own impact on American students who studied his textbooks is undeniable. Whether anyone buys a Saxon product because of this biography was not the purpose of the book. It was to tell the story of a man with a proven, simple, and successful way to teach mathematics to all groups among American students. He, in fact, called the math leadership's methods racist and sexist since the leaders openly stated that girls and minorities (except Asians) could not learn mathematics in the 2,000-year-old traditional methods. It didn't register, evidently, that mathematics is a discipline built by cultures and races from around the world.

Part 2: John Saxon's background

John Saxon was a West Point graduate with three degrees in engineering. He hadn't necessarily liked math as a subject, but he respected what it had done for his career as an honored pilot in the Korean War (the Distinguished Flying Cross), as a test pilot, and as a teacher at the U.S. Air Force Academy. When he retired in 1970, he began teaching algebra in a small junior college outside of Norman, OK. He was stunned by his students' weak skills in basic mathematics. They were the product of the federally-sponsored education program known as the "new math" of the 1960's. That curriculum focused on theory, not basic skills.

He ultimately designed a brand new method for re-teaching math to his students. It was based on "incremental development of skills through constant review." No chapters were in his books, just daily lessons for each day of the semester. (He called chapters "hunk learning" that required students to try and swallow a whole chapter and move onto the next one even if they didn't understand what they had just tried to swallow.)

None of the New York City publishers would publish his book. He wasn't part of the "inner circle" of educators. Worse, he didn't hold a "teacher's certificate." So he borrowed money and published his algebra book himself. This move, plus his irascible personality of digging in when he was pushed into a fight, set him up to become an opponent of the math establishment leaders. They declared war on him and, to their surprise, he fought back with a ferocity they had never experienced in their cloistered world of education.

Part 3: John Saxon's warnings come true

Today, Americans roll their eyes, shrug their shoulders, or joke about not being good in mathematics. It is a uniquely cultural phenomenon found only in this country. John Saxon had warned about the results of this attitude that began to grow after the federally-sponsored "new math" of the 1960's that focused on theory rather than basic skills.

This attitude is the basis of another crisis, among the many now being faced by America that are draining energy, time, and money from all areas of our lives—parent, government, and economic development. It is the cause of conflicting views, as usual, among different groups within America.

For example, while a Phi Delta Kappa poll reported in USA Today on Aug. 17, 2011, that 79% of American parents are satisfied with public schools, there has been a series of stories about the fact that 70% of community college and up to 40% of four-year college students must take non-credit remedial math classes. A new Harvard study reported this same week that a weakness in mathematics among Americans will impact our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by $75 trillion over the next 80 years. That's almost one trillion dollars per year, starting now! (http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG11-03_GloballyChallenged.pdf)

Isn't this a big disconnect from what parents say they think about public schools and the results those schools are producing nationwide?

Add $84 million from 1991-1999 from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to establish ideologically-driven curriculum that focused on equity rather than excellence during the Clinton Administration and the continuation of those grants today, to the $4 billion per year for private tutoring that has resulted from these curricula, and we have the financial reality of math education today. The program's purpose has morphed into supporting the reformist ideology, academicians' egos and status, and money-making ventures of those who control mathematics education.

Although the finger-pointing continues to be aimed at teachers and there is the recognition that home environments are part of the problem, what is continually ignored by the media is the weak, incoherent curriculum used to train teachers who then teach students. It's like trying to train gourmet chefs with lousy cookbooks which have constantly changing recipes which produce no proven, quality results.

This was the fight that John Saxon waged against the establishment. He believed that good material, as well as the teacher, was the source for effective teaching and enriched learning. He insisted that results matter. The "process," so adored by the reformists, was fine, he said, but it was honest results that led to recognition, excellence, and equality.

More can be learned about John Saxon's Story at http://saxonmathwarrior.com.

Order the book John Saxon's Story, a genius of common sense in math education by Nakonia Hayes on Amazon

To Accommodate, To Modify, and To Know the Difference:
Determining Placement of a Child in Special Education or "504"

by Nakonia (Niki) Hayes

With an exponential growth in special services being required for public school students who are considered to have learning disabilities and/or handicapping conditions in the United States, it is important to choose appropriately from the different levels of federally mandated services now available in school programs.

Imagine a large, ostrich-sized hard-boiled egg sliced vertically and cleanly, revealing the thick outside protective shell, the egg's white cooked area, and the egg's solid yolk. Now imagine a ruby in the center of the egg yolk.

This representational picture can be used to help people understand the relationships of all students in a school who range from the "regular" child with no handicapping condition or disability, to the student who is handicapped/disabled but who succeeds without special services, to the "substantially limited" student who needs some "accommodations," and to the student who needs which are called content "modifications."

The egg's shell represents all the students in the school. The egg white represents any student who has a recognized or perceived special need or condition that could impact his/her life. This student, for whatever reason, does not receive, require or ask for special services and is seen as a successful learner.

The egg yolk represents those children who also have some recognized or perceivedcircumstances and/or condition that substantially limits their learning. They have been recommended to a school committee and approved for special environmental/physical accommodations in their school setting, under the 1973 Rehabilitation Act's Section 504 statute. This federal legislation (originally designed to help Vietnam veterans), protects an individual's civil rights and guarantees nondiscrimination toward handicapped individuals, regardless of their ages. The American Disabilities Act of 1990 further protects these civil rights by requiring that reasonable physical accommodations be provided to remove barriers for handicapped individuals in the private sector: buildings, transportation, and communications.

Lastly, the ruby center of the egg yolk represents students who need modifications. These children need special instruction presented at their level of cognitive development.

Explaining and understanding the differences between accommodations and modifications in the school setting can help determine the most effective and appropriate placement for students who are deemed eligible for special help.

For example, the following are considered "outside-the-body"/physical/environmental accommodations. Many of these accommodations are used on a regular basis, or as needed, in the general education classroom. Most teachers see them as simply good teaching strategies:

• Pacing:extending/adjusting time; allowing frequent breaks; varying activity often; omitting assignments that require timed situations.
• Environment: leaving class for academic assistance; preferential seating; altering physical room arrangement; defining limits (physical/behavioral); reducing/minimizing distractions (visual, auditory, both); cooling off period; sign language interpreter.
• Presentation of Material: emphasizing teaching approach (visual, auditory, tactile, multi); individualizing/small group instruction; taping lectures for replay; demonstrating/modeling; using manipulatives/hands-on activities; pre-teaching vocabulary; utilizing advance organizers; providing visual cues.
• Materials and Equipment/Assistive Technology: taping texts; highlighting material; supplementing material/laminating material; note taking assistance/copies from others; typing teacher's material rather than using handwriting on board; color overlays; using calculator, computer, word processor; using Braille text; using large print books; using decoder for television and film; having access to any special equipment.
• Grading: giving credit for projects; giving credit for class participation.
• Assignments: giving directions in small, distinct steps; allowing copying from paper/book; using written back-up for oral directions; adjusting length of assignment; changing format of assignment (matching, multiple choice, fill-in-blank, etc.); breaking assignment into series of smaller assignments; reducing paper/pencil tasks; reading directions/assignments to students; giving oral/visual cues or prompts; allowing recording/dictated/typed answers; maintaining assignment notebook; avoiding penalizing for spelling errors on every paper.
• Reinforcement and Follow-through: using positive reinforcement; using concrete reinforcement; checking often for understanding/review; providing peer tutoring; requesting parent reinforcement; having student repeat/explain the directions; making/using vocabulary files; teaching study skills; using study sheets/guides; reinforcing long-term assignment timelines; repeating review/drill; using behavioral contracts/check cards; giving weekly progress reports; providing before and/or after school tutoring; conferring with student (daily, biweekly, weekly, etc.).
• Testing Adaptations: reading test verbatim to student (in person or recorded); shortening length of test; changing test format (essay vs. fill-in blank vs. multiple choice, etc.); adjusting time for test completion; permitting oral answers; scribing test answers for student; permitting open book/notes exams; permitting testing in isolated/different location.

Accommodations are used for students placed under Section 504 "protection," with an Individual Accommodation Plan (IAP) written and monitored by the school's "504 Committee." Students with a 504 plan remain in the regular classroom.

In many instances, once a child's needs are reviewed, a team of adults can decide to try certainaccommodations in a particular regular education setting, before resorting to a formalized 504 plan. If the regular education setting can accommodate the child's needs so that he/she can get "back on track," there is no need to write a formal 504 plan, which, if written and signed, becomes a federal, legal mandate to be followed by all individuals named in the plan.

In contrast, modifications of content material require structural, cognitive change in the level of the material:

• Presentation of Subject Matter: utilizing specialized curriculum written at a lower level of understanding.
• Materials and Equipment/Assistive Technology: adapting or simplifying texts for lower level of understanding; modifying content areas by simplifying vocabulary, concepts and principles.
• Grading: modifying weights of examinations.
• Assignments: lowering reading level of assignment; adapting worksheets, packets with simplified vocabulary.
• Testing Adaptations: reducing reading level of test.

It is easy to see there is a much more restricted and smaller list of modifications as compared to the lengthy possibilities found under accommodations. Judgments and hearings have begun to differentiate between these two resources which are being used to impact the learning programs of millions of students.

In other words, there is a greater demand for more appropriate placement of students, and better attention on how to meet their real learning needs.

Students tested by licensed diagnosticians or other certificated personnel, and who score significant standard deviations below their IQ, are considered potential candidates for specially-designed instruction, which encompasses all accommodations, modifications and related services needed by the child to achieve an educational benefit from school. We say such students may be "potential candidates" because a full-scale review of the whole child must consider the cause of his/her apparent cognitive deficiencies.

During that review, the team of adults may conclude the child needs not only content modifications, but environmental accommodations.

Remember the representational picture of the egg: The modifications relate to the student who is the ruby inside the egg yolk. The egg yolk represents 504 children who may need accommodations. Therefore, all Special Education students are automatically included under Section 504 for civil rights protection, and any needed accommodations, as well as modifications and related services.

If the committee declares the child eligible for Special Education services, an Individual Education Plan (IEP) is written. Like the 504 plan, this document becomes a federally-mandated "contract" between the school and family, but unlike Section 504, the IEP is tied to additional federal funding that helps pay the costs of educating the child.

Specifically, Section 504 with its accommodations is an equity issue. Special Education services, with its modifications (which may require extra expenditures for specially-designed instructional materials) is a funding issue, bringing in more dollars to a district and/or building from the federal government. (Special Education is regulated by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 1975 and its amendments of 1997.)

In summary, anyone looking at a student's records and assessments must ask, "Does this child needspecially-designed instruction due to neurological disabilities?" (It must be remembered that neurological deficiencies, or disabilities, are the result of organic problems or brain trauma caused by accident, sickness, or disease. Cognitive deficiencies can be the result of neurological impairments or from simply not knowing "how to learn," due to cultural deprivation and/or a lack of mediating adults in the child for "special education services."

Even if the child qualifies for Special Education, but he/she does not really need specially-designed instruction formalized in an IEP, the weight of consideration then falls upon which accommodations he/she might need to help bring about (or maintain) school success. And, this "success" is measured against what the student's peers or regular students would be expected to achieve in this present learning situations. The accommodations would not be used to determine what strategies would guarantee a student's success (or lack of failure), but what ones would help set up equity -- a level playing field whereby the student would have opportunities to achieve specified goals.

If the team determines the child needs only accommodations to improve his/her chances of success, the individual(s) choosing those accommodations should select about three (no more than five) such strategies/activities. For one thing, each accommodation that is checked must be done every day or for every event (such taking a test). Limiting choices to a few physical or environmental changes helps those working with the student to assess the effectiveness of the stated accommodations. Too many changes make if difficult to sort out which changes are having which effects. (This recommendation is also strongly urged for choosing modification for the eligible Special Education student.)

Finally, when looking at which accommodations to implement, it's especially important to remember the following: "Don't worry about fixing what ain't broke."

Also, by adjusting academic expectations through accommodations, adults often impactbehavior issues, seeing them diminish or even disappear completely.

The purpose of many academic/school accommodations is to offer a temporary situation while the student is being taught specific strategies of organizational skills, coping mechanisms, and self-control issues. The goal should be to ratchet the student's ability up to the point he/she can succeed without continual, special assistance.

This same reminder can be made about modifications for special education students. Many of them can advance to needing only accommodations. From there, many can reach that position of needing no special services.

This means that Special Education is a service, not a place. It also means that, for many, it should not represent a life sentence.

Why we call it Algebra (cached)
The Road to Building Critical Mass, Or How to Bring Real Change to U.S. Mathematics Education Nakonia (Niki) Hayes, Columnist EdNews.org February 15, 2007

First, Politics Require Understanding and Use
Mathematics education reformists warn us to keep politics out of the math "debates." That's a lofty and ideal goal. Political actions too often cause more problems than they solve as people see their issues as "wins" and "losses" that support egos and turf.

But keeping politics out of education issues, including mathematics, is no longer a reality. Putting the right people to work in that world is the tricky part. A successful program in any profession needs qualified individuals "working the program." The arrogance has been, for years, that only the reformists had "qualified" people to talk about mathematics education. Imagine their surprise to learn there are those on the other side of the argument who are equally qualified to speak on the issues.

In the meantime, reformists have used their powerful political allies, originally at the National Science Foundation, to help fund the disastrous modern history of mathematics education. It is reasonable to conclude that politics must be embraced by those who oppose the NSF programs and who want real, successful curricula of numeracy.

Second, Look for a Model
A model is offered that is now confronting the disaster of whole language and its effects on reading literacy. It is only because of new, major political muscle that reading literacy is being rescued from the reformists' methodologies that produced a generation (or more) of non-spellers and illiterate readers. This literacy recovery has been achieved because Pres. George Bush was joined by Sen. Ted Kennedy in sponsoring the No Child Left Behind legislation. That legislation included billion-dollar funding to support a return to proven scientific teaching methods of reading, and develop critical masses of educators and students.

Called Reading First, the program can give insight on how power players in the mathematics conflicts can achieve success. There power players exist in mathematics, mathematics education, businesses, and among legislators who want a balance of math instruction that includes both conceptual understanding (the reformists' program) and principles/basic skills (the traditionalists' program).

Third, Learn from the Model - Save Time, Energy, and Dollars
The steps in this model are explained by Sol Stern in the City Journal, Winter 2007, in an article entitled "This Bush Education Reform Really Works." Its subtitle is "Reading First, much maligned, succeeds in teaching kids to read." The summarized points have been written to reflect "mathematics education":

1. Secure powerful federal support - with a specific goal of solving, not just addressing, the problems in mathematics education. This will be needed to counter the billions spent by the National Science Foundation and private donors who fund reformist math programs.
   
   • Reading First has had a budget of $1 billion per year as part of the NCLB legislation. Reid Lyon, chief reading scientist for The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), and Robert Sweet of the House education committee, drafted the Reading First legislation early in 2001. They consciously designed Reading First to do an end run around the deeply entrenched whole-language movement.
     
     Sweet said, "Reading First was created to be a catalyst, to provide a financial incentive for schools finally to start doing the right thing for the millions of kids left behind in reading."
   • Said writer Stern, "You could say that Reading First was a $6 billion federal bribe to get districts to do what they really should have been doing already."


2. Watch the National Math Advisory Panel: - They have reportedly "set themselves a huge and appropriate task of rigorously evaluating all the research available, identifying facts, opinions, and old wives tales," according to an e-mail today from Dave Myerson in Mercer Island, WA. This action is highlighted in Stern's article:
   
   • Gather published, peer-reviewed studies that describe not just how children learn mathematics but why so many fall behind - and how schools can best keep it from happening.
   • Studies by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), a wing of the National Institutes of Health, sponsored reading research at universities, with scientists from cognitive neuroscience, pediatrics, genetics, educational psychology, and child development.


3. Face an instituted money hurdle and name it: - Science will collide head-on with ideologies and economic interests within the halls of public education. Interests other than pedagogical are at stake. A shift in teaching methodologies will put tenured jobs and professional development contracts from the $500 billion-plus education industry up for grabs.


4. Face another money hurdle and name it: - Progressive classroom instruction is promulgated by the education schools that monopolize teacher training. Education schools do not produce money for universities, so grants to promote ideologies bring money into the coffers.


5. Learn euphemisms: - Morphed descriptions of progressive education terminology are designed to make programs sound more reasonable to dubious parents.


6. Design shields against open hostility to science in the education industry:
- Nonetheless, demand scientific research that supports reform math programs. Fight attempts from reformists who demand "implementation of diverse kinds of scientific research, including teacher research. (Teachers evaluate instructional methods by observing their own classrooms; science be damned.)

7. Use respected sources for surveys: - Secure assessment through the National Council on Teacher Quality the percent of elementary education classes that don't teach the principles of mathematics and scientific math instruction. (For example, 85% of surveyed ed schools showed elementary ed classes don't teach principles of phonics and scientific reading instruction.)


8. Use winning strategies, with no shame: - Consciously plan an end-run around the deeply entrenched whole-math ideology, even with limited power sources.


9. Be prepared to compromise, but on your terms: - Reading First legislation abandoned the idea of requiring participating districts to use only scientifically tested reading programs. Instead, districts could also use untested ones, as long as they adhered to the principles of scientific reading instruction: phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension.
   
   In a book review by Bill Evers of Class Warfare: Besieged Schools, Bewildered parents, Betrayed Kids and the Attack on Excellence, written by J. Martin Rochester, this idea of compromise ("a potential middle ground") is addressed:
   
   • "...traditional education (solid content, drill and practice, teacher-led classrooms) modified by some of the defensible ideas of progressive education (emphasis on motivation, critical thinking, some projects, some field trips)."
     
     But, Rochester "is realistic in saying that is basis-plus compromise may be difficult to achieve in practice," writes Evers. That means the idea of basic-plus compromise must be held firmly. (Does that make it not a compromise?)
   
   
   • Special note on Bill Evers: He has just been nominated by Pres. Bush to be the U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education.


10. Use new dollars to push for a critical mass: - First critical mass will be composed of schools who sign on to the program, in order to ignite a countercultural education movement of teachers, parents, administrators, and education activists.
    
    • By 2006, there were 5,600 schools in 1,700 school districts nationwide who have received Reading First grants.


11. Push for a different critical mass with teacher training.
    
    • By 2006, there have been 100,000 K-3 teachers who have received/are receiving professional development in reading science. This has removed these early childhood teachers from the ed schools' ideological orbit.


12. Set a comprehensive study by an outside evaluator at the end of 5 years: - Record those who have succeeded and those who haven't, including those who have used the program and those who have not. Be clear about those who follow the progressive, ideological methods, and those who enlist for the money but do not show good faith or fidelity to the program.


13. Reprioritize funding due to congressional oversight: - More financial help needs to go to places that have really embraced scientific math instruction, are getting strong results, and are truly needy.


14. Name those who refuse opportunities: - Openly name education leaders in states and cities who, offered the solution, didn't grab it.

Everyday Math?
"As a retired elementary principal and secondary math teacher, I was asked to research the Texas State Board's decision to reject Everyday Math's third grade curriculum and offer any insight that might be of help to the Board.

I show, with facts from the publisher's own material, that they cannot meet Standard 3.4(a) in the Texas standards (TEKS). I also explain how Everyday Math's 3,000 pages of teacher materials should be beyond acceptance by any district. No, the 18 pounds of such materials according to state law is not a criteria for rejecting Everyday Math; but since the taxpayers are paying the bill for these materials, perhaps we should rethink some of our laws."

"Was the Texas State Board of Education correct to reject the 3rd Grade curriculum of Everyday Math? In fact, yes." doc By Nakonia (Niki) Hayes