I can understand why people stress learning 'content' but I feel their concern is misplaced. A case in point is offered by Joanna Muukkonen who describes "how difficult it is to learn mathematics without enough basic knowledge of it." Well, what is basic knowledge of mathematics? It's an axiom-based field; everything can be derived from a few simple rules. Learn the method and you can figure out the rest of mathematics for yourself, as you need it. But we do not teach the axioms as basic, we teach a few specially selected equations (2x2=4, for example) as basic. But, of course, this is not basic knowledge, it's a shortcut that, if memorized, allows the person to get by without actually learning how mathematics works. Consequently, mathematics becomes very difficult, because as you get more and more advanced you have to memorize more and more shortcuts. And that's the problem with 'content' - although represented as somehow foundational, it's not, and it is what is in fact taught instead of the genuinely foundational - the methods of mathematics, the literacies involved in reasoning itself.
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