Is it just m e I ask myself. I am not short of brains - although as I approach ninety I do sometimes wonder whether it is thinning out a bit. I have degrees and diplomas in various things and I held down and enjoyed doing quite important jobs. This is not boasting it is getting round to telling you that there was a huge hole in my education.
Now I am ready to accept that all of us go down a particular road. We develop an aptitude in a particular direction and usually follow it through. My aptitudes all involved the English language, its development into literature, poetry, expressionism. I taught along these lines and teaching English Language as a second language to children coming to this country from abroad. All well and good.
Now let's think for a moment about other subjects. I loved history and geography and keep my world atlas by my chair so th at I can look things up - if I hear something about a country and am not sure where it is I look it up.
But you will notice that one subject is glaringly obviously missing. MATHS. Yes, at Junior school I usually came top in the twenty mental arithmetic questions we had to do every morning. I could recite my times tables up to and including my thirteen times table. I knew my number bonds - didn't have to use my fingers to add them up. But that;s not maths to me - that is SUMS.
In my first marriage I always the did household books and organised the paying of the bills etc. In my second marriage I took over the financial running of the farm (always done before by my husband's niece who was an accountant) but steer me away from what I still think of as numbers and I am still like a fish gasping out of water.
Now retired long ago and pretty immobile I do all the Times Mind Games every day. Early in the morning is best, before the old brain tires-My favourites are not the word ones - the crosswords, the codewords and the like. No my favourites by far are the number games. And I am ashamed to say that the Sudoku - which come in the form of Gentle, Moderate, Difficult and Killer stumped me at first. Now I can always do the Gentle, almost always do the Moderate, occasionally do the Difficult and haven't dared try the Killer yet. And why? Well I think it is because I have suddenly realised just how very vital Logic is in Mathematics. What wont go in the space is usually more easy to figure out than what will go in the space. Every mathematical problem needs looking at from various angles to be able to solve it.
I honestly don't ever remember being told that at school . My beloved Chambers (I am on my fourth as the other three have fallen apart over the years - this one should last me - defines logic as - 'the science and art of reasoning correctly. logical elements which perform specified arithmtical functions (and another dozen lines my eyes are too tired to read at this time of day). It has taken 86 years to realise that there are more ways of killing a cat as they say than by choking it with cream.
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26 comments:
There's lots of things not taught in school. In addition (& more important, in my view) than math is how to be a moral, upright, honest, chaste, hard working individual. Maybe that was taught years ago but it certainly isn't today. Egads, could I ever climb up on the soapbox about this subject... but I'll spare you, Weaver. ~Andrea XOXOXO
I think that you are exactly right. In my case, as I matured, I became more logical. I was horrible at math. I never failed anything until I got into algebra and I was sick with not understanding it. My poor algebra grades got me in very big trouble at home, which seemed to compound the problem: the more fearful I became of punishment, the less logically I approached numbers. I always just accepted that I was dumb with numbers. But one day, someone was having difficulty with Algebra and said, "You're smart..." and pushed the book at me. I said that I was awful in math. The thing is, I studied the lesson and very quickly figured out the process, which I taught back to him. I thought it was a fluke. In college, I took a class called mathematical logic. Much to my surprise, I found it easy. I got an A. Moreover, I enjoyed it. That will always be amazing to me.
PS: if a child is not taught morals at home, school will be of little help.
Maths were never my strong suit but I managed until I bailed after algebra. As a nurse, dosages were figured out by the pharmacist so there was little math needed from me which was fine. I loved patient care and later worked mostly in the operating room (theater).
You added to your education during all of those travels you went on!
Hugs!
Ny best friend is similarly afflicted, except her bar is set much lower than yours! Her son, my godson, is now two exams off qualifying as a Chartered Acountant, and she is still wondering how she managed to produce him! Like you, though, she excelled at English, and having semi-retired, is now undertaking an OU Sociology degree. We are all different - just as well.
One of my proudest achievements was passing A level Maths!!
here in the U.S. it seems to me that the boys were fonder of math and did well. my mother was a math whiz and that always intimidated me so I just disliked math completely and dropped it once we got to algebra. my forte was English...spelling, writing, lots of reading. now-a-days both granddaughters are college graduates with tip-top math, along with their specialties. very different. but anyway, I should say that your blogs certainly reflect your intelligence - despite your age. I'm not too far behind you & my memory is beginning to slip a bit....takes me longer to recall. You're a prime example of aging gracefully. It's a delight to read your thoughts.
I am sorry you can't leave a comment I don't know why, Sue at A Simple Life left a comment.
I am not up to speed on blogging so I don't know what the problem is. Su
My father taught maths...then he changed jobs and taught children!!
His idea was play with the numbers, find patterns, make it fun.
I scraped through the exams, high enough not to resit!!
Tell me why I mess up on the easy sudoku, but often get the medium or hard ok?
Oh my word, I was dreadful at maths, just couldn't understand it. I wasn't even good enough to do the GCE, I had to do Special Maths, and failed that spectacularly!!!😂 Move forward a few years, working as a barmaid (to save for a mortgage) and I was wizzo, blooming wonderful with money and change etc. It just sort of 'fell into place ' like never before, and has stayed there ever since. OK, I'll never do trigonometry or higher maths, but my word, I really have showed them wrong. I actually acted up to an executive position as Finance Manager for Wales and the West Midlands in a national organisation. I really wish I could tell all those teachers who wrote me off as a failure! To be honest, it was the teachers who have me the basic building blocks, but some of them were too quick to right you off if you didn't get it straight away. Hey ho. 😘
How embarrassing, spelling write wrong to an English teacher. I think I'll go to bed now. 😴😴
I never achieved any great academic success but was good at English, but Maths was a nightmare for me from which I never quite recovered. I enjoy all the word puzzles but number ones defeat me. However, a few years ago I was not good at cryptic crosswords but by trial and error I am 'moderate' now, so maybe I should have a go at the simpler Sodukos. You never know till you try.
I had bad experiences with negative teachers who berated me for being stupid at arithmetic and maths. That has stayed with me for the rest of my life. Thankfully now I can use my cell phone calculator. I was praised and encouraged with writing and composition and love reading so English was no problem.
Dunham Lass - reading your blog today brought such happy memories of life of the farm back. Again I couldn' leave a comment it just wouldn't let me but I will keep trying.
It seems you could have pursued any career and succeeded well. The fact you decided to teach meant you enjoyed teaching and felt most comfortable. I always find career choices very interesting. I've known people to study and do extremely well academically but not like the associated career. Today, people change careers quite readily.
I've never tried Sudoku. I avoid most of the word games and logic games; they scramble my brain before I begin.
My 'brain' seems to operate by logic. I became a Latin scholar, was a good problem solver, loved algebra and geometry, but couldn't remember the dates of battles or reigns for love-nor-money. I have three books always at hand; a large Latin dictionary, a large Etymological dictionary, and the inevitable Thesaurus.
I do not have any dictionaries beside me though sometimes I wish I had a Thesaurus to choose different words. As to maths, no good except like my generation of children who were brought up on tables and mental testing, I can add fairly quickly.
As you have been doing Sudoku for a few years your post puzzles me. Clearly you have been aware that no adding, subtraction, multiplication or division is involved in the puzzle and it could just as well be a puzzle with colours, letters or shapes.
Rachel - it is necessary for the numbers inside the box to add together to make the number in the corner and for all digits from one to nine to occur once within the box.
Cro - I keep my Thesaurus to hand too because now at my age the 'right' word often refuses to come into my head when I want it - it waits until the middle of the night.
I was thinking just the same as Rachel regarding Sudoku. I do several a day and it is definitely nothing to do with maths. I am also of the opinion that the majority of us just need to know " sums". (I have never used algebra etc. in my daily life)
Sudoku has never appealed to me, but I do enjoy solving a puzzle by logic.
At school, my strenghts were always with languages. I am fascinated by words and sounds, and would love to learn more than the four I am fluent in. I keep saying I will do that when I retire, which won‘t be for at least another 13 years or so.
I got zero for my maths O-level, Weave.
I think that it can depend on the teacher sometimes. My first Maths teacher at secondary school explained everything so well and she kept telling us that girls could do maths as well as boys. The second teacher was brilliant at his subject but could only teach it to those who were already very good and he constantly told us that girls were useless. My strengths though were always English, History and Art.
Absolutely fascinating to read all about your strengths and weaknesses at school.I totally agree about how important the teacher is. Anyone who watched the programme on Jay Blades last week - when he went to his careers teacher he was told - Blades you are nothing - useless - you'll never get anywhere. Look at him now - Dyslexic and only learning to read at 51 his ability in wood work is brilliant and yet he was never put in a woodwork group at school.
Thank you so much for sharing yourselves.
Debby said...
PS: if a child is not taught morals at home, school will be of little help.
You know, that used to be the old way of thinking but not anymore. Children spend, on average, less than 15 minutes per day in face-to-face contact with their parents. The people they spend the most time with is their peers (who know NO more than they do!) and also their teachers in school. If those teachers don't teach them morals, values, honesty, and all the rest.... they're simply NOT going to learn those things. As is evident with the condition of our society today. xoxo
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