As I've mentioned before, with the exception of math, science & special-ed, you pretty much have to know somebody to get a decent teaching job. There is the possibility I could get a middle-school English teaching job in the ghetto but frankly I'd rather work at
Hot Dog on a Stick.
So in order to get the job I want I need to get something called a Foundational Math certificate. So while I look in vain for a new gig I'm also concurrently studying for this Algebra test which would get me the valuable piece of paper. I need to take two tests, one covers Algebra and Number Theory which I will take in November, and the other covers Geometry and Statistics which I will take in February. Now this is not high-school level geometry. It is stuff at the very back of the high school books maybe, but definitely college level, even abstract algebra.
A sample test is here. Now considering that the credential only allows me to teach up to high school algebra, it is rather puzzling that the test is on all this other wacky stuff, but there is very little the govt. does that doesn't puzzle me.
I really have had a bad relationship with algebra because of an uninformed decision I made back in high school. As a Freshman in high school in Seattle I took it. The way it usually worked back then was you would take a year of Algebra, a year of Geometry and then most people were basically done with the requirements and had lots of options. If you wanted to continue on you would take Algebra II, Trig, Calculus, that sort of thing. So I did so-so in my 9th grade Algebra, which I took from Sept - April. Then basically because I couldn't stand my step-dad, I switched schools (and states) mid-year and transferred to a school in Eugene.
I can still remember the conversation with my new guidance counselor as if it were yesterday. She was helping me make up a schedule and told me they had two Algebra classess available, proper Algebra which I had been in up in Seattle, and something called "Elements of Algebra." She said that unless I was a real hotshot math student I should go with "Elements" since I had enough else to deal with, a new school and living situation and all. Now that may sound like reasonable enough advice, except she failed to mention to me that it would put me on the 'stupid kid tract' and that I would be taking 'Elements of Geometry' for my Sophomore year, and not until my Junior year would I start fresh again in proper 'Algebra' which I would then have to take another full year of, then proper 'Geometry' in my Senior year. My grades weren't brilliant but I was a bright kid.
As far as my 14yo brain could figure out, I was just going to be in a slightly easier math class for the next few months until June, no thought at all as to what the further ramifications of that would be down the road. So of course I said sure, sign me up for 'Elements.' So it was challenging enough stuff and I really thought nothing more of it until my Jr. year. Honestly my entire Sophomore year I never bothered to ask, "What will I be taking next year after Elements of Geometry." The whole time I just assumed I would be able to walk right into Algebra II or some other advanced class. I knew it wasn't particularly challenging for me, but I was a high school kid and was worried about more important things.
Then when scheduling for my Jr. year came up and they said the only math option I had open to me was to take Algebra 1 all over again, from the beginning for an entire year, I just about lost it. Then that would be followed by a year of Geometry as a Senior. As you can imagine I could not stand being in that Algebra class again, and it basically rubbed off into everything to do with school. I quit the class half-way into the year because the minimum math requirements for high school graduation at the time were 2.5 years of any math I believe. You actually didn't need to complete Algebra to graduate. So that was it, as far as I was concerned I was done with math for good and I disliked school in general. This is what
Dewey might define as a "mis-educative" experience. I was a bright kid yet I never properly finished math because of the system they had and because I didn't take the initiative to look into it early on.
I had learned to hate Algebra, and when I went to community college for the following two years, only basic math was required for my ridiculous Radio Broadcasting degree. You didn't even have to take a proper math class, you just needed to pass a few tests and you would get the credits and were good to go. So of course I was all gung-ho about Radio at the time and could have cared less about math.
So to try to keep a long story from getting too long. The title is actually incorrect because I did finally pass a college class called 'Intermediate Algebra' back in Seattle when I was getting my transfer degree at North Seattle CC for UW. For who knows what reason, I decided at the time to go back to school to become an elementary school teacher in 1994. (Here we are in 2009 and I still have never managed to get an Elementary Classroom teacher job. For the record: I have five years teaching experience total which is in middle-school and K-8 tech. Plus a few years teaching English overseas) I needed to take nearly a year's worth of classes at a CC on top of my previous associates degree to be automatically accepted and admitted as a Jr. into a 4-year University, which included Mat 101 - Intermediate Algebra. It was called the WA state transfer degree. That class was basically high school Algebra II done in about 12 weeks, and I had no problem with it, despite not taking any math classes in the prior 6 years. My grade was a 3.5 for anybody who cares.
At UW I think I needed two more classes in math to get my BA in communications and I took a series of two classes called "Math for Elementary School Teachers" as that was my focus. In my Masters program at Evergreen it was more of the same sort of thing as well. I remember we were given a few lectures on statistics so we could make sense of the research articles we used for our Master's Paper, but basically at the end of all of it, I held a Master's Degree in my hand and I had only ever finished basic Algebra.
So while I had a big hand in my mis-education due to lack of interest, I do blame quite a bit of it on the lack of information given to me back on that unfortunate day in April 1986. Because of that, this damn Algebra Dragon just keeps popping back to life, unvanquished. I plan to slaughter that dragon in a few months.
Then I will become the dragon to my future math students.
UPDATE: I just learned that what I'm studying now is actually referred to as "Elements of Calculus" at some schools! FUCK!
