Professor Howard Fehr, head of the mathematics department at Columbia Teachers College, is generally an amiable man. but he can become blunt when talking about the abuse his subject takes in the average U.S. school. "The mathematical education of most math teachers," says he, "ends in the ninth grade.'' They teach arithmetic as if it involved nothing more than totting up grocery bills or figuring compound interest, completely fail to give their pupils any glimpse into the concepts that lie behind the subject. Last year Fehr took on the job of collaborating with TV Producer Richard Pack of the Westinghouse Broadcasting...
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