Word: mathes
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Investigators were told that in childhood Ted seemed to avoid human contact. As their firstborn sulked through grade school, his parents suspected that he might be unhappy because he was so much brighter than his peers. In those years "he was a discipline problem," admits Robert Rippey, a retired math teacher at Evergreen Park High School who remembers Ted fondly as one of his brightest students. "He drove his teachers up the wall. So in high school we had to figure something out." What his parents and school officials arrived at was the accelerated curriculum that allowed him to skip...
...served them soft drinks in jelly jars. But unlike Ted, David demonstrated a gift for human contact. Though not much of an athlete, he joined the other high school faculty for Thursday-night basketball games. "You could talk to Dave about anything," says Jim West, a junior high math teacher. "We used to kid him about being so smart, and he'd say his brother was so much smarter that he had a hard time talking to him. That was hard to imagine...
...account of the schools and cram courses, but they may not even be learning what they ought to. Ichiro Ozawa, the leader of the main opposition party, argues that the educational system is at the heart of Japan's difficulties because it simply forces children to memorize and solve math problems. That may have been sufficient when Japan needed nothing but obedient, selfless workers, but it does not nurture the right skills for Japan's future. "Japanese lack self-reliance and a sense of the individual," says Ozawa, "without which there is no democracy or creativity...
...mastery." Boundaries seemed to be off limits, and parenting seemed to consist of cheerleading. "They're getting a tremendous education from having their lives be in the real world," Hathaway had said. "What it takes to get this flight scheduled and done is much better than sitting in a math classroom." Whether or not her children could do long division, they were seen by the townspeople who knew them as bright, curious and confident. "You get the feeling that everyone in the family was at peace," says Zona O'Neill, a Massachusetts friend. "My children enjoyed being around them because...
...COMPUTER'S WINNING AT chess that disturbs me; a simple calculator can beat me at math. But when the computer sitting across from chess champion Garry Kasparov is instructed to play, and its screen reads, ''I'd rather not,'' then I'll start worrying about whether the next person I meet is a Terminator. Independent thought is the advantage we humans (currently) have over ''thinking'' machines. CLAY LOOMIS Arroyo Grande, California Via E-mail...