Times table to be learnt at Primary School

just to make sure everyone understands, it is not the teaching of the times tables that is to be introduced (this already happens - a lot) it is the formal testing of them. And as Mr M says above it will not drive up standards.

Like most on here have said it is a myth than more 'mature' people are any better than children at arithemetic

And it's also not all primary school children as stated in the OP but schools in England, whether other parts of the UK will follow suit or already do this is not mentioned.

And it's also not all primary school children as stated in the OP but schools in England, whether other parts of the UK will follow suit or already do this is not mentioned.

Write your comments here...Indeed - It is only England where the problem lies apparently. According to the BBC news  So Brue is quite correct.. 

The Scottish education system is, and always has been,  superior to that of south of the border. So I would contend that the problem does not apply up here. 

K 

spot on there K, as always your finger is on the pulse of scottish educational issues

The Scottish Parliament's cross-party education committee will hear the views of teachers, parents and others as part of its year-long investigation.

It came amid concerns that too many children from poorer families leave school early without qualifications.

in Scotland that is

I recall recently reading an article which compared standards in the 50s and now. Interestingly this suggested that there has been little if any improvement in standards across the discipines taught mathematics and arithmetic. Also, In the 50s a very high percerage of pupils where regularly absent for school, some never attended and lots of children who were of primary school age did not appear in the statistics, as they do today, for a whole raft of reasons. Comparisons are not as simple as these sound bites suggest but I guess you would need to understand those mathematical aspects of statistics to grasp this. 

The research can be acquired here

http://comprehensivefuture.org.uk/talk-by-adrian-elliott-author-of-state-schools-since-the-1950sthe-good-news/

oh and...

The leaders of seven councils have called for a national taskforce to be set up to help deal with teacher recruitment problems.

They made the call at a summit on tackling teacher shortages in northern and rural parts of Scotland.

In some areas, scores of posts are unfilled and adverts have been failing to attract suitable candidates.

and

 "Many councils in the north and north east of Scotland are experiencing higher than normal levels of teacher shortages - particularly at senior management levels.

and

The shortages are at their worst in Aberdeen city, where a fifth of its primary schools have no permanent head and 50 teacher posts are unfilled. That was despite repeated efforts to boost recruitment with “golden hellos” for new teachers worth £5,000, recruitment drives in Ireland and Canada, and low-cost flats in the city reserved for teachers

you are recruiting overseas? really?

And it's also not all primary school children as stated in the OP but schools in England, whether other parts of the UK will follow suit or already do this is not mentioned.

Write your comments here...Indeed - It is only England where the problem lies apparently. According to the BBC news  So Brue is quite correct.. 

The Scottish education system is, and always has been,  superior to that of south of the border. So I would contend that the problem does not apply up here. 

K 

It is very sad to see you drop down to racist posting Kennine. The Scotland great but England is not mantra is not acceptable. I have never seen anything on CT that has not given praise to the Scots & Scotland that warmth & friendship is then repaid by your derogatory post. Very sad.

More on this tables lark (and back to the OP) but just knowing your tables does not make you numerate. I often get the 'I know my tables.. kids nowadays don’t....' bit, usually in a pub when people find out I teach maths.

I play along and ask them some hard tables question which they do get right, I then ask about the petrol station I’ve just passed with petrol at 99p and diesel at £1 and 4p a litre. Two cars go in and both put in 20 litres, how much did the petrol car save compared with the diesel?

The answer to this gives you a very good idea of how numerate they are:

I didn’t learn my 99 times table – totally innumerate and a moronic answer

I don’t know my 20 twenty times table -better but knowing their two and ten times tables didn’t really help join the dots up between them did it? So much for knowing their tables.

How they then tackle the problem shows how good they really are.

Some do 99 times 2 then times by 10, the same for £1.04

Some say that 99p is 1p off a £1 so it’s 20 times 1 and 20 times 4 – much better

Some find the difference between 99p and £1.04, which is 5p and times that by 20 – even better.

I think numeracy is a VERY important skill, no one admits to being unable to read but some are almost boastful about NOT doing maths.  I work with lots - when they are trying to work out their holiday, all allocated in hours, or flexi sheets, still done manually, it's a joke.  Especially if they need to use a calculator to 'do' them sums as they aren't sure about 0.5 being 30 minutes .  One of the reasons for knowing times tables means that you can have a rough idea of whether the calculator is giving you a reasonable answer

If I compared the type of early maths education I had..eg how many bucketfuls of coal would fill a bath at a rate of whatever ....to the computer programming and advanced maths that is being learnt now, I think we should be pleased with our teachers and their students. (I never quite "got" the relevance of the bath bit and I think I might have enjoyed the computer bit!)