Does the thought of mathematical equations make your knees weak
and your heart tremble with fear? Would you rather lock yourself in
a room with ten thousand black widows and a few million venomous
snakes than attend your Algebra II class? If so, you may suffer
from the severe and debilitating disease, Math Anxiety.
Does the thought of mathematical equations make your knees weak and your heart tremble with fear? Would you rather lock yourself in a room with ten thousand black widows and a few million venomous snakes than attend your Algebra II class? If so, you may suffer from the severe and debilitating disease, Math Anxiety.
I, Christina Elaine Bryant, am a victim of Math Anxiety. It took many long, exhausting nights fighting with my mom over the completion of my math homework before my condition was finally diagnosed. I knew that when the word “math” rang through the air my airways would constrict and the world would tilt in a rather unpleasant and nauseating manner, but I didn’t know why this happened or that there was actually a name for it. Helpful phrases like “Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally” made no sense to me. Order of operations? Right. All I wanted was for dear Aunt Sally to excuse me from my math tests.
A friend of my mom’s once talked about how relieved she was when the use of the term PMS became widespread. At last, there was a name for the dreaded affliction from which she suffered each month. Although she still enters the subhuman realm on a regular basis, she can take comfort in the knowledge that her condition bears a name; it is therefore legitimate. I feel exactly the same way about Math Anxiety.
Math Anxiety is real, and it exists on a much wider scale than I ever could have realized. When I did an Internet search of the term “math anxiety,” the computer found more than 122,000 hits in .11 seconds. I soon discovered I was not alone! It is estimated that about 96 percent of the U.S. adult population suffers from some degree of math anxiety.
Math Anxiety can be a disabling condition, causing humiliation, resentment and even panic. Does this sound familiar? “Math exams terrify me. My palms get sweaty, I breathe too fast, and I often can’t even make my eyes focus on the paper.” Or “I’ve hated math since I was nine years old, when my father grounded me for a week because I couldn’t learn my multiplication tables.” How about, “In math there’s one right answer, and if you can’t find it you’ve failed. That makes me crazy.”
These are all excellent examples of comments about Math Anxiety. Victims suffer from a feeling of intense frustration or helplessness about their ability to do math. These feelings about math are common in everyone to some degree. Even the best mathematicians are prone to anxiety.
There are many causes for Math Anxiety, including social and educational causes, math myths, and misconceptions. “It is interesting that in our American culture it is okay for an adult to say that they are bad at math, although no adult would admit they are not good at reading or writing,” states David Foster, Math Program Director of the Silicon Valley Noyce Foundation. Mathematics has developed a tarnished reputation in the American society, with many people believing that math is difficult, obscure, and of interest to only “certain people”, like Calculus geeks.
This concept of math is even being communicated to students through teachers who actually teach math. Reform efforts in the teaching of mathematics have been under way for several years. Teachers are slowly becoming more conscientious about the behavioral attitude they present to their students about math. An increasing number of educators are trying to make the subject more enthusiastic, fun and applicable to daily life.
For more than seventy years, the teaching of math has relied on a paradigm, which emphasizes learning by memorization and repetition. This means that a particular type of problem was presented, together with a technique, formula or solution, and this was practiced over and over again until it was sufficiently mastered. Afterwards, the student was hustled to the next problem, with its particular type of solution. All of the ideas and concepts behind these solutions and techniques often lay dormant, omitted from the lesson all together.
Personally, I am only confident about a math operation if I can understand the reason for it. Sandy Devlin, a Math Coach for the Morgan Hill Unified School District and 2002 Morgan Hill Teacher of the Year, feels that we give students too many math concepts to focus on without giving them the chance to fully master the system.
“We focus on too many concepts, so we don’t give a child the chance to learn something well and in-depth. If we taught fewer skills each year, we wouldn’t have to re-teach things at the beginning of each year. They would already know it because they would have spent enough time on it.”
“The biggest culprit to Math Anxiety is poor instruction,” said Foster. “Too many teachers believe that math is about memorizing facts and procedures only. In a typical Algebra II class most problems are isolated equations and expressions devoid of a real context. Human brains are not wired to make sense out of non-contextualized situations.”
Many people believe the myth that being good at math is genetic. Some people are just born with the ability to understand mathematics, while others are not. Mathematical ability is inborn, but it is inborn in all of us. It is a human trait, shared by the entire race. Having a special genetic make-up is not necessary to understanding math.
My mom believes that I was born with math ability, because it was easy for me to understand money math. Actually, I have always been good at anything shopping-related. There is also a myth that doing well in math means you’re able to make fast computations, be error free in calculating and that real mathematicians don’t have to work at it and that answers just pop into their heads.
“Actually, good mathematicians work very hard at math,” Foster said. “They fail regularly in their efforts to solve problems and often mathematicians use very few numbers. Math can be about geometric figures and spatial relationship; it can be about the best route from one place to another. Math can even be about how knots are tied or how waves are formed. So if a student has inclinations for different areas of math, they often drop out early because they don’t add, subtract, multiply and divide at lightning speed.”
Here are ten easy ways to reduce your Math Anxiety: 1. Avoid negative self-talk. 2. Ask questions. 3. Consider math a foreign language – it must be practiced. 4. Don’t rely on memorization to study mathematics. 5. READ your math text. 6. Study math according to your own particular learning style. (For me, it’s comparing everything to shoes. It always works!) 7. Get help the same day you don’t understand something. 8. Be relaxed and comfortable while studying math. 9.”TALK” mathematics. 10. Develop responsibility for your own successes and failures.
So, to all you math phobics out there: Good Luck!
Chrissy Bryant is a senior at Live Oak High School. She alternates weekly with Melissa Ballard in writing Teen Perspective. Contact Chrissy at ed****@*************es.com
