I see that this situation is bad, but think the problem goes far deeper. I also wonder if SF is delaying algebra because CC math isn't giving kids what they need to understand it. I mean, not that what came immediately before CC was so great, but....
My son was in CC 8th grade math this past academic year. Everything was fine until the end of the first semester, when it jumped from stuff that made sense to solving systems of linear equations. The course hadn't gone over graphing a single linear equation yet, and he was justifiably confused.
When I talked to him, he said he'd gone over some of "that stuff" in 7th grade, but "I didn't understand it then, either." He would have struggled with algebra had he continued with that course (the school let him switch to an old pre-algebra book).
I wrote to one of the CC authors after learning that other kids (some described here) were hitting the same roadblock. I said that I admired what the CC was trying to accomplish, and asked if this particular part of CC math was problematic. The response was that "it would take me an entire day to explain it to you" because I obviously didn't understand linear equations. Emm. Okay. He reminded me of what the Everyday Math advocates said to the STEM folks who questioned EM's approach to arithmetic: "You obviously don't understand this stuff."
So okay, fine. The CC is under fire and this guy was circling his wagons. Might make him feel better, but won't help the situation.
I feel very sad when I think that many kids in this country are being cheated out of a decent education because of fads (compounded with textbook company profiteering). Though to be fair to Pearson (!), what should we expect when the gentlemen in charge of CC math wrote up a list of bullet points standards and expected that the textbook producers would be able to turn them into pedagogical gold?
