&gt; <i>&quot;start with a few problem questions, built around every day scenarios&quot;</i><p>One of the difficulties here is termed &quot;cultural competency&quot;.  Textbook writers sometimes try to write in &quot;every day scenarios&quot; that end up being much more familiar to middle-class suburban white kids than to lower-class inner city latin-american immigrant kids.  Math problems that are supposed to reference familiar everyday scenarios sometimes end up turning into lessons about language or culture.