Posts by author: Inessa Rifkin
Inessa on nerds and cool people. This column first appeared in The Jewish Advocate (subscription required): How a nerdy mom saved her son from the clutches of cool Inessa Rifkin I magine extraterrestrials landing on earth. Their mission: Understand earthlings, their language and cultural habits. Assuming these creatures were reasonably competent, they would show progress [...]
Inessa on whether students’ scores should be discussed publicly. This column first appeared in The Jewish Advocate: Face up or face down? Should a teacher return a marked quiz face down to protect a student’s privacy, or face up, where it can be seen by the entire class? At Russian School of Mathematics, we distribute [...]
Yesterday I read an article in the Washington Post discussing the movement in some states toward making Algebra II mandatory. I found the article via Get Schooled blog post at Atlantic Journal-Constitution. Below is my comment on the issue. America is the country that really believes in numbers. Students are not performing well – give [...]
A couple of weeks ago an article on The Fordham Institute page positively commented on the results of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). They wrote: Among the findings: In raw numbers, the U.S. produces many more high-achieving students than any other OECD nation—more high-achievers than France, Germany, and the UK combined (both in [...]
I want to tell you about one of my great students at Russian School of Mathematics. We’ll call her Elizabeth. Liz is 11 years old. She is in my pre-calculus honor class. She took her SAT when she was 10 and scored 800/800. Half a year ago she took her SAT II IC — this is the test that is usually taken by 11 graders — and scored 800/800. All of that at the age of 11.
A couple of weeks ago I gave a test to my math class. Every lesson I give my students a short 20 min accumulative quiz on everything we have learned since the first lesson of the school year. Instead of teaching a topic, testing it, and putting it to rest, we, at Russian School of Mathematics, continue testing on old material along with the new throughout the entire school year. We call this spiral learning.
I’m a founder, principal and CEO of Russian School of Mathematics. I’m a math teacher, and above all I’m a mom. On these pages I will log stories of my continuing journey into the world of math education and beyond.
