re: (Not Common Core)-- Why are they teaching math this way?

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So nobody has addressed the issue when parents are taught math the old way and their kid runs home and asks a parent to help them understand something.

There is now a certain level of Greek thrown in the most basic math problems?

Are kids expected to learn solely at school these days? My son isn't even 3 yet so I need to know if I should start relearning math or not in a new way now.

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I'm a terrible math student, and I have no issues following what's going on. It may take a minute or two to see what they're going for in terms of the way they're working a problem. but I've yet to run across anything that makes no sense at all. Some seems like a waste of time and adds unnecessary steps...but again, I'm such a shitty math student I'm willing to forgo bitching about this in the hopes that this way helps prepare him for higher math later down the road. Some of it, I kid you not, is actually easier than the way I remember being taught...more intuitive.

In short...if your kid is not paying attention, is not that bright, or you are already prepared to be angry about this "new" math, you'll be unhappy. Thankfully, my lack of math skills are accounted for by my smart child who pays attention in school so when he comes home with an assignment I don't have to reteach him the "new" way, only follow along, grasp the new way, and help him if he gets into jams.

After last year, I gave up openly bitching about this...no bitching from me resulted in no complaining from my son. He understood it, and I was only poisoning the well.