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In 1885, a short pamphlet was published containing a strangely compelling story - a kind of cross between Edgar Allan Poe and the Wild West. It claimed to record a letter written in 1822 by a Thomas Jefferson Beale to a Mr Morriss, which in turn claimed to contain three encoded texts (now known as ‘B1′, ‘B2′, and ‘B3′) describing the location and beneficiaries of a huge treasure haul hidden in Bedford County, Virginia during 1819 and 1821.

Matt Townsley HS math educator turned curriculum & technology directorAssessment enthusiast

The Learning Network provides teaching and learning materials and ideas based on New York Times content. Teachers can use or adapt our lessons across subject areas and levels. Students can respond to our Opinion questions, take our News Quizzes, learn the Word of the Day, try our Test Yourself questions, complete a Fill-In or read our Poetry Pairings.

Finland's schools owe their newfound fame primarily to one study: the PISA survey, conducted every three years by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The survey compares 15-year-olds in different countries in reading, math, and science. Finland has ranked at or near the top in all three competencies on every survey since 2000, neck and neck with superachievers such as South Korea and Singapore. In the most recent survey in 2009 Finland slipped slightly, with students in Shanghai, China, taking the best scores, but the Finns are still near the very top. Throughout the same period, the PISA performance of the United States has been middling, at best.

Compared with the stereotype of the East Asian model -- long hours of exhaustive cramming and rote memorization -- Finland's success is especially intriguing because Finnish schools assign less homework and engage children in more creative play. All this has led to a continuous stream of foreign delegations making the pilgrimage to Finland to visit schools and talk with the nation's education experts, and constant coverage in the worldwide media marveling at the Finnish miracle.

Number sense, concepts, and operations word wall The purpose of the mathematics word wall is to identify words and phrases that students need to understand and use so as to make good progress in mathematics. Mathematical language is crucial to children's development of thinking. If students do not have the vocabulary to talk about math concepts and skills, they cannot make progress in understanding these areas of mathematical knowledge. They need to be familiar with mathematical vocabulary and mathematical terms to understand written and spoken instructions. See math word wall resources >

Did you ever read a book called “The Number Devil”  by Hans Magnus Enzensberger? If you ever see a copy of it, grab it and have a look. In chapter one, Robert, the hero of the story, meets the Number Devil. The Number Devil explains to Robert that knowing a little bit of arithmetic, such as addition and subtraction, is quite useful for when the batteries of your calculator run out but really it has little to do with mathematics. How often do teachers fail to grasp the distinction? How often do we overstate the importance of the “skills” that we fail to recognize the importance of their application? It’s like a football team that focuses so much energy on their training sessions that they forget to turn up to play their game.