What Comes Around Goes Around...Eventually

 

Long Division: So named...or at least this is what I thought back in the 4th grade...for the excruciating amount of time it took one to puzzle through that rat's nest of confounding numbers and come up with the correct answer.

That's right, friends. I was not a mathlete.

Oh, I could write a stunning book report and illustrate it with an equally smashing picture. I was especially proud of one in which I drew a woman paring a red apple and I took special care to make certain that the curling lines looked realistic enough to be recognized as peel. I could make a papier mache bas relief map of Texas or talk enthusiastically about Eli Whitney and the cotton gin or the Navajo Indians. 

I could not, however, make sense of numbers. I wasn't a moron...I just didn't see the world as a place where numerical knowledge was all that necessary or desirable. Unlike the way words immediately summoned elaborate pictures to the front of my brain, numbers did not do any such thing for me. Cold, unfeeling and enigmatic they were. Dead looking...like shark's eyes.

My father, an engineer, had no patience in general, and his desire or ability to teach me anything mathematical sounded like even less of a good time to him. New Math sent him into acute apoplexy because he only knew one way to "do sums" and it was the way Moses had taught him has a boy...and By God...that should have been good enough for whatever teacher I had who was throwing a monkey wrench into the matter with the new stuff. My mother had the patience but not the ability to break down the information and show it to me piece by piece. She didn't like math either and had no idea how to make me understand something that she had willingly left behind her so long ago. 

They say that numbers never lie, but they do, because every one I ever looked at told me repeatedly that I wasn't very smart. And I believed them.

So it was decided that I would go to my aunt's house. She was an elementary school teacher and one who sat me down at her dining room table one afternoon and told me to forget everything I knew about division so that we could start fresh. It was the first thing anyone had said to me about math that made any sense at all. She brought me a cold drink and a stack of paper and a newly sharpened pencil. I remember the air conditioner whirring in the background. She never yelled or stalked off muttering to herself as though I was a half-witted cat to whom she was attempting to teach French verbs. She went through each step as slowly as I needed to and when my eyes started to glaze over, she backed up and did it again. Then she gave me a ten question quiz and left me alone.

I made a B. By the skin of my teeth...but a B nonetheless. I felt so good.

Fast forward to this past Monday when it became apparent that I was to be teaching a 4th grade class where math would be involved. And wouldn't you know? We were doing division.

For a moment I hesitated and the old fears and insecurities started to cloud my head in a way that was familiar and terrifying. But I walked to the board and started explaining. They had questions...oh yes. Plenty of them. But we handled them all and soon I felt like the kid who was riding a bike for the first time and yet not really understanding why she wasn't falling headlong over the handlebars. 

Of course, I knew what I was doing. I'm in my 40s for pity's sake. What's not to understand about division? But it wasn't about MY being able to work the problems easily and publicly. It was about understanding why THEY didn't immediately get it.

And I? Did. Because I had been there before. Just like them. In the 4th grade and completely discombobulated by that string of numbers. Thinking that everyone else around me knew instinctively how to solve the problems, when in fact someone had shown them the formula until it made sense and now? Someone had shown me,too.

I'm not a patient person, but I have to say that aside from having kids of my own? Teaching has helped me cultivate more empathy for others than I ever thought possible. And I learned that though it's important to be able to master a concept before you're able to pass it on to someone else, it's also helpful if you once sucked at it, too. Who knew?

That whole "paying it forward" business is a pretty cool concept. I believe it makes the world a better place. What they don't tell you is that sometimes it takes years before the opportunity comes along that actually allows you to repay what someone has done for you so that someone else can benefit. 

 My time took 39 years to get here.

Comments

[shonda]

Math was always my least favorite subject. I often wonder now if I was really that bad at it or if my utter contempt and lack of effort made it seem that way.
Good for you for beings so saintly!

[phd in yogurtry]

I remember some harrowing evenings as a kid, my dad trying to teach my brother math. Thankfully, my husband has more patience and he helps the kids out.

[Jenn @ Juggling Life]

I am a test taker--I've rarely met a test I didn't enjoy taking. Except one day a couple of years ago when Social Butterfly called me minutes before a Spanish midterm to tell me she was throwing up and needed to be picked up.

I sat down to take the test and remembered NOTHING. Everything had left my brain and no matter how hard I tried I could not retrieve it. I ended up with a D on the test, but learned more about anxiety and test taking than if I'd written a dissertation on the subject.

Empathy is amazing.

[NancyJak]

I have a feeling if kids have had you before for a sub, they are thrilled when they see you when they walk through the door the next time.
Long division in third grade was my nemesis. I bounced back and forth all year long between the "smart" math group and the "dummy" one.
My mother sat with me and pounds of paper she recycled from work probably and wrote out long division problems by the dozens. She encouraged me and got me through it. It didn't get much better when I hit h.s. and barely got through Algebra I and II and Geometry - and review math? total bust.
BUT I'm a wizard at accounting - so I guess the basic add and subtract is my forte.
My son? Taking calculus next semester as a freshman in college. After his placement test last spring they determined he could take any math class they had to order. His plans? Accounting!
Have a fabu weekend - you deserve it!

[Michele]

It was nice that you had an Aunt that could take the time to show you the light. No such luck here. Math is why I'm a librarian.

[velocibadgergirl]

I'm not very good at math either, and as a child it would frustrate me to the point of tears.

Now I teach science to girls, and I always always always point out that girls can be good at math and science and that it's important not to give up. After all, I managed to squeak out a B in calculus in college, and if I can do it, anyone can.

xo!

[velocibadgergirl]

Oh, and my sister? She's planning to get her PhD in math. I find it rather scary and impressive ;)

[Hilary]

"They say that numbers never lie, but they do, because every one I ever looked at told me repeatedly that I wasn't very smart. And I believed them."

I remember that feeling well. Your awareness of those beliefs are in part what makes you a good teacher. Your students are lucky to have you.

[clickmom]

As an ex-third grade teacher I have to say that division was one of the most frustrating, challenging, and ultimately rewarding things I taught. After all the blank stares, when the little light switches in their heads start to flip on one by one it was such an exciting feeling! I'd jump up and down like I had just heard my name on the Price is Right or something.

People who think teaching is easy should be shot. In the thigh, just for the shock value, not to kill them or anything.

[Janet]

I was very lucky. My father (also an engineer - I keep discovering more and more that we have in common) was also a math genius, and managed to pass enough of that to me that math didn't give me any trouble. Actually the things that gave me trouble were the things I was bored with. I looked at math as a puzzle and I've always loved puzzles. Algebra was wonderful (geometry not so much, too much memorization of stupid theorems). But when I got to statistics in college I crashed and burned in a big way. This was mostly due to the professor who thought women should not be in college and refused to give me the extra help I asked for, saying I was obviously too stupid to be there. And of course I believed him (self-confidence was never part of my repetoire).
You are a godsend. I'm moving to Texas so my kids can have you for a teacher.

[The Other Laura]

Math kicked my ass all through school and I still don't enjoy the process - even with a calculator!
One of those early teachers just blew past me and I could never figure how to catch back up.

These kids are lucky, lucky to have you.

[Coyote]

I didn't have the experience of relaxing into math until I had to take a "Fundamentals of Math" class when I was in college. This was the class for liberal arts majors who chose their degree plans based on the presence or absence of math classes, but I was fortunate to have an instructor who helped me understand it all. Suddenly it made sense! Thank goodness you and all the other good teachers are there to give these kids a solid foundation.
Oh, and that aunt who worked with you? As the person who raised my husband she's listed in Wikipedia under patience.

[Mary]

I'm not the only one in the universe who sat befuddled and exasperated during math class! What a relief. I was an A student, including math, until the dreaded New Math was introduced. My dinosaur of a teacher was having none of that nonsense, so she just answered "Read the book" whenever we asked questions. She didn't understand it any better than I did. That year threw my scholastic career off course forever. I have a serious mental block about math. In fact, I walked out of the college math placement test without finishing. I can add, subtract, multiply and divide with a calculator, which is all I need for my job. Luckily, my kids are math smart.

[stephanie (bad mom)]

Once I started shopping (figuring percentages, solving for unknowns), math became friendly. And having lived through the fear of dying while public speaking (from junior high until college), I now feel like a far better speech teacher.

You're so right - we pass on more useful info through our experiences than through our book knowledge.

[vodkamom]

Math has ALWAYS kicked my ass. Even when I had to teach as a fifth grade teacher. I LOVE problem solving and brain teasers, but HATE all that other shit.

[trapped]

I got here via "Not a girl, Not yet a wino"... I like your style... I'll be back ;)

[trapped]

I got here via "Not a girl, Not yet a wino"... I like your style... I'll be back ;)

[Cheri @ Blog This Mom!]

Elementary-school math is KILLING me right now. How did I ever get through college and law school?

[JCK]

I had a math background similar to yours. :) Incredible insight you have about all of this!

[Green Girl]

The best teachers are those who didn't get it easily the first time around. Your students are sooooo lucky to have you!

[V-Grrrl]

The voices in our head are our biggest enemies. I always thought I was not good at math. And yet, I got all As in math. I was on the math team in high school. I scored respectably on the math part of the SAT.

When I went to college, I was enrolled in calculus. Coming from a rural school, I'd never had an AP class or even a pre-calculus class. Most of my classmates in there had taken calculus in HIGH SCHOOL.

I struggled, struggled, struggled--and still I got a B. Yet I was convinced I was bad at math and discarded thoughts of pursuing a minor or major in environmental science because I couldn't face Calc II.

How sad I made that decision based on the idea I was "stupid" at math.