Maths teaching to be made more practical

Following on from recent developments in language teaching based around the use of smuggled cigarettes, the Department of Education is now taking a similar approach to the area of mathematics.

“For too long Maths has had trouble engaging with youth” complained Jane Billingsworth, government spokeperson on Youth Culture. “In classrooms all around this great land we hear the wail of ‘But sir, when am I ever going to use that’. Whether it be trigonometry, fractions, long division, it always seems to unrelated to their lives”, she continued, speaking in between runs on the half-pipe at Stockwell Skatepark.

“What we propose is to revolutionise teaching in Maths. Fraction teaching will be based around how to work out how much a quarter of hash for yourself and an eighth of Jamaican black for your mum will cost. Number theory will be taught with the conventional number line but the milestones will be “number of months until baby born, council house application” and so on. Estimation will be taught based on scratch card and cider purchases and the number of days until giro day.

Ms Billingsworth explained, after her third and successful attempt to complete a frontside 360, that if the changes to Mathematics are as successful as expected this approach will be extended to other subjects.

“Physics will still focus on the Newtonian laws of motion, friction and so on, but with practical application to avoiding the Filth, the best cars to nick and their associated physical driving characteristics.”

However the changes are expected to only see improvement in academic performance.

“Hopefully this will engage young people. But we don’t expect miracles, teenage boys will continue to dress as though they are wearing their pyjamas and girls will continue to smell like Cuban ashtrays.