Research paper finds that proficiency in math outside of school and proficiency in math in school do not necessarily match up.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08502-w
Many children from low-income backgrounds worldwide fail to master school mathematics1 ; however, some children extensively use mental arithmetic outside school2 ,3 . Here we surveyed children in Kolkata and Delhi, India, who work in markets (n = 1,436), to investigate whether maths skills acquired in real-world settings transfer to the classroom and vice versa. Nearly all these children used complex arithmetic calculations effectively at work. They were also proficient in solving hypothetical market maths problems and verbal maths problems that were anchored to concrete contexts. However, they were unable to solve arithmetic problems of equal or lesser complexity when presented in the abstract format typically used in school.n = 471), enrolled in nearby schools, showed the opposite pattern. These children performed more accurately on simple abstract problems, but only 1% could correctly answer an applied market maths problem that more than one third of working children solved
Perhaps an example on these forums would be top academic students with A grades in math courses in school having difficulty figuring out what their unweighted GPA is.
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blossom
February 12, 2025, 11:25am
2
Or kids who have trouble understanding that if their college budget is 30k per year and they don’t qualify for need based aid, a college with a sticker price of 80k per year and a typical merit award of 5k goes in the “longshot” column, not the rock solid safety column!
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system
August 11, 2025, 11:26am
3
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