Studies from all sides point up how many bright young people are turned away from the field by a whole battery of factors. The factors affect everyone, but disproportionately they affect women and minorities. Women and minorities, observes Shirley, are like the canaries on the shoulders of miners. The canary keeling over carries definite implications with regard to the health of the miner. That heavy responsibility therefore rests on the shoulders of the teachers in those grades.
Elementary teachers have a huge and enormously complex job.
We may have strong feelings about what they should be doing with one part of their job, but given that there is no earthly way we can understand how that part fits into the rest of their job, there is no sense whatever to our attempting to tell them how to do it. The rest were for how an individual mathematician can become involved in ways that will both be helpful to the teacher and provide an opportunity for the mathematician to find out more. Volunteer time at your local school. You might tutor on a regular basis or offer a twice weekly mathematics enrichment class so the the classroom teacher can have more time to work with the children who need extra help. You could mentor a child who has a talent that needs nurturing, resources and guidance.