On Fri, 2013-06-21 at 22:10 +0530, Deepa Mohan wrote:
> I wrote this some time ago....someone else referred to it on FB
> recently
> (yes...a woman.) What makes us detest certain subjects at school, and
> why
> is Maths (or Math) frequently at the top of the list? It can't always
> be
> bad teachers....
I think it is a combination of aptitude ("innate ability") versus
curriculum.
Maths teaching in Indian schools demands that a certain degree of math
skill must be acquired in a specified period of time and "proof" of such
skill be demonstrated in an examination in which you are supposed to do
math and get all the answers right within, you guessed it, a specified
period of time.
Math teaching links math with time which is a mistake. Poorly worded
math problems with ambiguous meanings sometimes add of a high school
child's woes.
There are some math skills which one child may master in a few weeks but
another child may need two years before he can do the same consistently.
The latter child is dubbed "weak in maths" and begins to hate or fear
the subject. There are some math problems that one child will get 100%
correct if he is not forced to do them in 3 minutes or 5 minutes. Such a
child may get every problem perfectly right if he is given two or three
hours rather than one in a test. You are never given exactly 7 minutes
to glance at your bank account books to ensure that it all tallies up
for you. You can take as long as you like. Why are children treated
differently?
In World War II, teams of mathematicians (women mostly) were tasked
with calculating and creating tables that would serve as a ready
reference for artillery men who would need to know the exact angle at
which the cannon had to be fired for the shell to land at a particular
spot after taking into account air temperature, altitude, wind direction
and speed, range of target, weight of shell and weight of propulsive
charge. (This is done in milliseconds by computer now). But these women
would be away from the front line and they would check and cross check
their manual calculations for errors. A child who wants to do that with
his work is prevented by putting a time limit. Why do we treat our
children this way?
I think people get put off math by unimaginative teaching and many
people who are "good" at math are only good at hacking the math system
and not good at math per se.
I think it was Feynman (Deepa, Feynman was a Nobel prize winning
physicist, and an extraordinarily brilliant man) who argued that it was
more important to get the problem solving technique right rather the
arrive at an answer that is spot on in math.
sorry for the longish ramble...
shiv
