Looking for mathematics teaching article

Question

Some time in the last month, I read a great article somewhere on the web that discussed the sorry state of secondary school math education in the U.S. One of the examples in that article was a discussion of how geometry is designed to wring the last bit of joy out of mathematics, and included the "formal" proof that a triangle inscribed in a circle with one side on the diameter is a right triangle together with a lovely almost-proof that one of the writer's seventh-graders came up with.

I unaccountably failed to bookmark the article, and would love to find it again. Does this ring any bells with anybody?

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 04 '14 at 03:09

3

Were you thinking of A Mathematician's Lament?

answered Apr 04 '14 at 03:09

user134824

12,212

1

Excellent article, by the way. – user134824 Apr 04 '14 at 03:11
I know. I was really kicking myself for not bookmarking it. I thought it was maybe on the maa website, but their search engine is just awful. I figured someone here would know what it was. – rogerl Apr 04 '14 at 03:12
Now that the question is answered, you may find interesting to read Edward Frenkel's Op-Ed on the LA Times, How our 1,000-year-old math curriculum cheats America's kids. – Andrés E. Caicedo Apr 04 '14 at 03:23

Looking for mathematics teaching article

1 Answers1