My Own Maths Journey

I loved ‘doing maths’ as a young child. I hated ‘doing maths’ as a preteen. My attitude improved again by the end of primary school but took another massive nose-dive again during high school. This made me think, “What went wrong?” At some point, maths went from being fun to a source of anxiety and until relatively recently I was one of those people who “was never good at maths”.  Let me take you now on a journey through my experiences with learning mathematics from early primary school into adulthood. Perhaps some of you will relate.

Year One

My first year of school offered many and varied new mathematical experiences. As I remember, counting was not a new experience for me although grouping things into sets of similar things took a bit of getting used to. My strongest memory is of our teacher using cardboard cut-outs which she stuck to the board with magnets, to teach us how to add and subtract. Who remembers the wizards and ice-cream cones on the cartons the cones came in? She used those. The best part was being called upon us to come up to the board and move the objects around. The interaction maintained my interest as I eagerly awaited my turn. I still remember the little click the magnet made as it stuck to the board. Oddly satisfying you might say. We had competitions about who could add up the cones and wizards the quickest. So, my introduction to maths was a pleasant one.

Year Five

The first few years of primary school were similar in the way that maths was taught. We manipulated concrete materials (I loved the Cuisenaire Rods) and worked together to complete puzzles and we all seemed to enjoy our work. Year five; however, was different. The mathematical concepts were more complex (long division and working with fractions and decimals) and the way we were taught just made it hard work. We had to sit quietly at our desks (no talking) and listen to an explanation, try to remember it, then complete problems on our own in our maths books. Mistakes were frowned upon. The dreaded red pen was the weapon of choice. The emphasis seemed to be on what was done incorrectly rather than the parts that were right. So, this continued for the duration of year five and I developed the attitude that maths was not fun after all but was actually meant to be difficult.

Year Seven

My final year of primary school from a mathematics perspective was the most productive of all. Our teacher was extremely patient with us; not so with my own personal behaviour which is another story. She had a lot of time for those of us who were a bit slower and not as confident as some of the other kids. My year seven teacher’s style was often open discussion during mathematics lessons which gave an opportunity for the kids who were struggling with the subject to be assisted by more capable students in the group. For example, discussion sessions during the teaching of basic algebra encouraged students of all levels of ability to have an input into possible solutions to problems and instead of “being wrong” we were encouraged to explain why we had come up with that solution. My enjoyment of maths was restored.

Year Ten

In contrast to my late primary school years, my experiences with high school mathematics caused a great deal of anxiety and self-doubt. The mathematical concepts were difficult to understand but, not so bad, since I’d overcome difficulties before. The difference was that you either got it or you did not and there was very little time for our maths teachers to spend one-on-one time with students who were struggling. That was not necessarily the fault of the teacher. It’s just the way it was.

My teacher would rarely speak during lessons. My strongest memory is my teacher demonstrating an algebraic algorithm on the board and after each line would turn to the class and say, “Agreed?’ Nobody spoke so he moved on. I was drowning. Not wanting to be the only one in the class who didn’t get it, I sat silently and suffered.

Year Eleven and Twelve

My attempts to gain a passing grade during my junior high school days were barely successful at best, but successful nonetheless. I gained a passing grade in Advanced Maths in year ten so in year eleven I attempted subjects in Algebra and Calculus. My attitude to maths had not changed since year ten but I still believed that if I applied myself I could at least achieve a passing grade. The teaching methods in year eleven and twelve were like year ten only even less supportive. We were given a single explanation of a concept on the board. “Ok everyone, think back to last year. Now, let’s turn to page so and so and solve for ‘x’ using first principles.” Me – “Urm…what now?” When I asked for help the teacher would stop the class and explain the concept again to the whole group exactly as she had done initially. Well, that was no help. My attitude toward mathematics was confirmed that year and I withdrew from the subject and enrolled in Social Maths for year twelve, a subject more suited to life skills rather than the rarefied air of academia.

University

A long time passed between high school and uni. I had a career in the military, raised a family, and travelled around the country. I decided to become a teacher (go figure). So, off to university to learn how to shape young minds. The subject “Teaching Maths to Primary School Children” inevitably showed up on the curriculum. Memories of the anxiety I felt during school came flooding back and I began thinking about how I could possibly teach something that I was never good at. A lot of us had that same attitude. In fact, there was a whole assignment on it. We had to express our attitude to mathematics and where it came from. Our lecturers were outstanding. We not only revised basic maths principles but we were shown why they worked and how to teach them to kids who struggled with learning them. It all made so much sense.

During my course, I took on tutoring kids in Maths and English. One of my students (he was in year five – interesting) was struggling with basic numeracy. I could see how anxious he was, and it brought me back to my time at school. Then it clicked. Learning mathematics should be fun, at least in the formative years. It was not the mathematics I was anxious about; it was the frustration I felt because I found learning it such a struggle in a traditional “I Do…We Do…You Do” classroom environment. Then I thought, at what times was I happiest learning maths, and it was when my classmates and I were playing games and not being punished for wrong answers. The Shortcut Game’s story falls out of this experience. You can read more about that on this site.

So, my experience with learning mathematics has gone full circle albeit a lumpy one. As a result, I’m now committed to making mathematics more fun to learn. And not just for school kids, but for everyone. I’m sure there are some adults out there who, like me, were “never good at maths”. One thing I tell my students now is that maths is not hard, you just get better at it and the best way to get better at it is to practice and have fun while you’re doing it.

Take care, Gene Graham.

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