Publishers appear to think students get very interested when they see how math can be applied to real life. Here are some examples taken from my school geometry textbook:

Chapter 3.1: Measuring Angles
Why this is important - You can measure the angles of your house.

Wow! That's so exciting! I can measure the angles of my house! I'm going to do that right now!

Chapter 4.6: Use Congruent Triangles
Why this is important - So you can find the distance across a half pipe.

Now that's my idea of fun!

Chapter 6.1: Ratios, Proportions, and the Geometric Mean
Why this is important - You can estimate bird populations.

How did they know that was my dream?

Chapter 7.1: Apply the Pythagorean Theorem
Why this is important - You can find the shortest distance to a camp fire.

Oh yeah, definitely. Next time I go camping, when I'm on a certain spot, I will totally mark it, run back and forth with measuring tape, measure the legs, take out my calculator, apply the Pythagorean theorem, and then triumphantly run towards the fire shouting, "The shortest distance from that rock over there to here is 58.2 feet!"

I can totally relate to this!! Here's a problem in my Alg 1 textbook:

Parties: Joseph want to have 40 guests at his party and if he only has one cake that weighs 2 pounds, how many ounce will each person get?

I mean, how the h*ll are parties related to math?

As soon as I started reading your comment izzy, I knew it was written by you

And what does the school system have against number theory and combinatorics?

Here's my teacher's explanation of "Succeeding in math":

If you just memorize all the correct formulas, follow what I do exactly and do all of the homework, you're gonna be great at math.

My blood boils just by listening to that. I'm not gonna say anymore for the fear of being banned.

Wait, are teachers interested in AoPS books at all? Even if everything else there is dumb, it would still be useful to go if there was interest, and it would be kind of surprising if there was none.

Hmmm so I _am_ a fan of purpose-directed math learning in the earlier stages: I learned / realized why calculus would be useful by learning how to calculate the amount of hay in a haystack using tables. Ew, tables are annoying. How can I do this more generally?

And I learned polynomial expansion through trying to determine genome probabilities so I knew how probable certain things I wanted were, when breeding plants.

Besides, problems about Roland and Orlando's explorations through Europe are fun too .

But some pop-fun things are stupid indeed.

Instead of letting this depress you, take it as encouragement, because it shows that what you're doing is important and sorely needed.

Bah, my earlier comment got eaten cuz I switched networks and wasn't logged in anymore...

Just as there are many people who do not enjoy math and do not think it is inherently beautiful / elegant / interesting, there are many people who are not motivated to learn for learning's sake.

I remember when numb3rs was first pitched as a show to get people interested in math just like what CSI (and spinoffs) did for forensic science. (Un)fortunately, people realized that math wasn't something that you could just go to a trade school for and have it be a useful tool. (Just as people realized that forensic science is not as glamorous as CSI and is an actual science. But that hasn't stopped places from offering 2-year degrees in criminal forensics, a somewhat scary thought if you ever get accused of anything.)

I consider analytical problem solving to be an extremely useful skill for, well, solving problems. But for the average person, learning how to program and getting rich off of a social network / cell phone app is a much more attractive prospect than actually solving *important* problems (e.g. human impacts on the environment, energy, healthcare, financial crisis, etc.).

People seem to say that a lot.

There's nothing wrong with showing how math is applicable to the real world, but when textbook writers really struggle to find some application, it sounds extremely false, e.g. measuring angles of a house.

I homeschool two sons, and as folks at AoPS probably know I do not mind spending money on good texts or online courses.

But for my 7-year-old the best math curriculum I've found so far is available from a university website in England for free download to schools and homeschools. It's based on a Hungarian program and "sneakily" introduces the basics of counting and functions while 5-year-olds are just learning to add 2 + 3.

I have no problem with applying math to sports -- my very mathy older son learned to calculate averages by keeping track of his bowling scores, and he asked me to teach him long division so he could calculate earned run averages, both while still in public school. Whatever motivates kids is fine, as long as they're really learning math. I think the problem with a lot of texts in current use is that they just don't teach math and don't teach thinking.

One of the reasons -- not the only -- that I'm homeschooling the younger son is that the math textbooks adopted in the local schools 4 years ago are horrible, beyond horrible. There's been a sudden drop of interest in MathCounts between the 7th and 6th graders at the local middle school and I have no doubt that the math texts the younger kids were brought up on are partly responsible. The MC coach whose team has won states for the last 6-7 years successfully pleaded that this series not be used in the middle schools, but somehow her arguments against using it in the lower grades didn't carry weight. So by the time she's seeing the students, the damage is done.

I'm sure textbooks in some other subjects, such as history, are as bad as many math texts, but at least history teachers don't tend to feel compelled to use the book.

I didn't just notice Dr. W -- I've known about him for a long time. I've just never had the pleasure of meeting him. I'm also indebted to him for introducing Will Nygard to us 6-7 years ago. Will became an SDMC student, an AoPS summer intern, and built our first grading team at Harvard and MIT. He did a fantastic job for us, and now is working for Sandor at Jane Street.

I look forward to having the opportunity to work with Dr. W more directly in the future; he and I discussed trying to find ways to introduce AoPS to schools in the districts around him.

Edit: Yes, I'll add it to my Life After MATHCOUNTS talk...

You CANNOT be serious.

Well, that's school (and life...) for you.

It would also be nice if those textbooks were accurate.

And their websites.