Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis wants to take feelings out of the equation.
DeSantis on Monday defended his education department’s rejection of math textbooks as part of an effort to eliminate social-emotional learning, a teaching philosophy that helps kids manage their feelings and show empathy for others, from the subject curriculum.
“Math is about getting the right answer. We want kids to learn to think so they get the right answer,” DeSantis said at a press conference in Jacksonville.
“It’s not about how you feel about the problem or to introduce some of these other things. There’s a right answer and there’s a wrong answer. And we want our students getting the right answer.”
DeSantis said objective subjects like math should remain uncluttered by “political” content, such as social-emotional learning and critical race theory.
“It’s not about how you feel about the problem … there’s a right answer and there’s a wrong answer,” Gov. Ron DeSantis stated. Rebecca Blackwell/APThe Florida DOE also junked proposed textbooks that adhered to the federal Common Core curricular framework that the state has rejected.
DeSantis said Monday that the approach made it impossible for parents to help their kids with basic math homework and impeded learning.
The polarizing Florida governor also highlighted that much of the content his DOE found objectionable targeted students at younger grade levels.
Florida’s Department of Education rejected math textbooks as part of an effort to eliminate social-emotional learning. Paul Hennessy/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images“We’re going to focus the education on the actual strong academic performance of the students,” DeSantis said. “We don’t want things like math to have some of these other concepts introduced. It hasn’t been proven to be effective and quite frankly it takes our eye off the ball.”
The department invited publishers to submit math textbooks for use in the state’s public school system in 2021.
The agency said 21 percent of the submissions were rejected “because they incorporate prohibited topics or unsolicited strategies, including CRT.”
Gov. Ron DeSantis previously banned critical race theory as a curricular element in Florida schools. Douglas R. Clifford/Tampa Bay Times via APOverall, 41 percent of math textbooks were deemed unfit for use.
DeSantis previously banned critical race theory as a curricular element in Florida schools, arguing that it promotes racial division and undermines the development of personal agency.
