Me and Mathematics
Finite Math—-Calculus—-Differential Calculus—-Honors Seminar in Finite Math: I have been contemplating the differences among these as I have been registering incoming freshmen students for fall classes at the New Jersey college where I teach. Biology majors need to take Calculus; Biotechnology majors, Differential, and that meets four days a week instead of three; everybody has to take two math courses and yes, we will note AP scores. More than other subjects, math has been evoking responses of interest and comfort, or worried expressions and words: “I think I’ll wait until junior year to worry about that, math and I don’t mix.” As I entered streams of letters and numbers into the computer while “make SURE you get your photo taken for your ID now this is your LAST CHANCE” sounded, I sometimes noted my own difficulties with calculus in particular and math in general.
Well, what do you think? Am I good at math, or is it enough that I can balance my checkbook? Read on for the answer…….
Either way your are semi-right: I was good at math, once upon a time. Math was a class to count on, where things worked when you applied what the teacher showed you, and reviewed the textbook and your notes. But somewhere, somehow in my senior year of high school while taking Calculus, things stopped making sense—-the formulas and equations and graphs became a muddle. I was already tending towards studying literature and languages and I struggled through the textbook, and put it away with relief, but also with a sense of failure and of loss. Meanwhile, most of the members of my family were majoring in engineering or science and studying computers, technology, and software development; I declared Classics—Latin and Greek—as my main fields of study; wrote for an alternative newspaper; and went through books and books of lyric poetry.
When I read about Simon Baron-Cohen’s latest research study—-that “there is a group of genes that codes for both mathematical ability and autism“—and that his research team is seeking to hear from those “who have a grade A or above in GCSE English and a grade C or lower in GCSE mathematics” in the July 11th Times Online—-something resonated in me. My mother has always spoken of how her father was “good with a slide rule” and really good at math (he was a civil engineer and a bridge inspector for the state of California). Most of my cousins went through Calc as part of the natural course of things, while I was the oddball carrying around Catullus. When I talk to my students about math—-and especially when they describe their fondness for the order and orderliness of math and show me their latest math t-shirt—-old memories of logarithms resurface and I think, someday when Charlie is working and I am not, I can take out the calculus book again and try to make sense of it.
Charlie himself has yet to being doing math at school. Numbers fascinated him when he was young—-he learned these when he was 2 1/2 years old—-but using the numbers to count, add, subtract (vs. arranging number flashcards in groups of three and staring at them) has been far more difficult for him to learn.
“I used to be good at math,” I say now. But give me a Shakespeare sonnet to interpret, or the music of Charlie’s warbling……
5 opinions for Me and Mathematics
laurentius-rex
Jul 13, 2007 at 7:08 am
I am currently arguing with SBC about this, because I do not think it will be a very good study at all, not only because Mathematical skill is not one thing only, but that using GCSE’s for selection is not the best tool for selecting whatever it is the study is looking for.
Mathematics and number skills are not necessarily the same thing.
Kristina Chew, PhD
Jul 13, 2007 at 9:54 am
What is on the GCSE?
AnneC
Jul 13, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Interesting. My experience with math in school was almost the opposite of yours — I struggled greatly with basic arithmetic, but then did very well in geometry and got an A in my first calculus class.
And the funny thing was, after taking “higher” math, the arithmetic and algebra suddenly started making sense. It was like a spontaneous light bulb went on in my head. Geometry was the real turning point for me, probably because it introduced a visual component to the mathematics; once I could associate numbers and variables with shapes, my brain was able to see how formulae worked and such. Multivariable calculus was fun too because we got to deal with lots of cool graphs of 3D shapes.
Aidoann
Jul 13, 2007 at 1:42 pm
I’ve always been good - though apathetic - in math. After about seventh grade, I lost almost all interest in math classes, though I still love math for the sake of math. After algebra, I really didn’t have very good math teachers (I had the same one for three years).
Now, I’m a student of chemistry and physics and math is meant to be something that is secondary and only meant to get me into the upper science classes. Unlike science, which is more conceptual and about understanding things, math presents its own sets of challenges.
-Aidoann
Do you have an engineer in the family?
Jul 17, 2007 at 5:20 pm
[…] piers of the New York/New Jersey waterfront—on the Irish waterfront. I never got too far with math myself but several relatives (including my mother’s father) were or are engineers […]
Have an opinion? Leave a comment: