Things Aren’t Adding Up
by Sami Davidson
“Sami, I don’t think you’re gonna be a good teacher. Do you really think that you’ll be a good teacher if you can’t do math?”
Since math is so easily tested, so deliciously measurable, tantalizingly assessable, it’s easy to look at a nine-year-old and give them the coveted academic title: gifted. So why couldn’t I wield such power? What was so confusing to me about learning to divide, and why could my tablemate do it with ease? Better yet, why did she get to leave the classroom once per day and learn to do math with the other smart kids? The only place where I excelled was reading--yes, it’s assessable, but so much less interesting--but all I could do was read and write stories. Sure, I was two or three years above my reading level, but who cares! My ability to do some backwards, convoluted multiplication method was subpar at best, so I must not have been smart. It’s that simple!
The visible academic segregation started in third grade, though I’m sure the assessments began much earlier. We were tested in the beginning of the year, and, if we did well enough, we were sent to what I was convinced was simply an oasis known as “Advanced Math.” I sat on the orange carpet and looked up at my teacher, Ms. Dulyk, as she sent the two or three kids in my class who had qualified to their special math class. “For the rest of you,” she said, “we’re going to talk about what a ruler is.” My friend Smitty, who was in advanced math, and I were in that class together. Over Ritz Crackers and pudding, she asked me what we did during our math time “because with Mrs. Olinto in Accelerated...we’re already learning our times tables!”
It only got worse in middle school. We were separated into the red and white teams.
Those who were arithmetically superior were pushed into their own insular network of genius. All of my friends were in that group; I felt more isolated than ever; at the time, the district didn’t offer a program for advanced reading and writing until we had made it through eighth grade and all of its awkwardness. At some point, when I was in seventh grade, I looked down at a problem dealing with the slope of a line and having to find its intercept. I felt my eyes flood with tears and my cheeks get hot because I couldn’t understand but Michelle could and Alyssa learned this last year and Beatrice is laughing at me and it’s all because I simply must’ve been so impossibly, unteachably dumb. I actually had wanted to be a pediatrician or an OB-GYN, but once I found out about how much math was involved I shied away. I had no confidence whatsoever that I would ever be able to learn when I was told time and time again that I wouldn’t.
And why would I? In high school, I had friends who would make fun of me because I couldn’t understand logarithms. I still don’t. My chemistry teacher picked on me constantly because I always had another question, always needed extra help, or for someone to explain to me what had just happened in class right before. He had even said to us that we weren’t as smart as those in Mrs. Couzis’ honors class. My friends were in that class. It hurt a lot. My “math friends,” as I would come to call them, would pass me around for easy NHS tutoring hours. They knew I needed the help and I did. I let them do it. They needed me to help with their AP Language and Composition work, but made fun of me for needing their help. It was like a symbiotic relationship. At the end of 11th grade, Alyssa won the “Excellence in English and Writing Award” for work that I did.
In college, I bounced around. I was thrilled to come in and start learning about how and what we’re teaching and how we’re entering the profession of changing lives. I loved my education classes, soared through my English courses, and even squeaked out an A in my math class first semester. In May, after the final Math for Elementary School Teachers 1, my friend and I went to Starbucks. She had seen that the final had been hard for me, and that I had started crying towards the end as I feverishly erased the same spot over and over and over again. Over her Strawberry Açai Refresher, she asked me the key question. Would I really be able to be a teacher if I had a hard time with math?
Oh my god. The tailspin. I mean, I clearly thought she was right. It was so easy; in just two sentences, she had reinforced everything I really believed about myself. How could I ever be good enough, worthy enough, smart enough, enough, if I couldn’t do math? And how could I possibly TEACH CHILDREN if I couldn’t do math? I went back to my room and looked at pictures of my mother and grandmother--both teachers (or former teachers) who struggle with math--and tried to calm myself down. I was so upset that I really did try to change my major.
Three separate times. At the end of that class, I had a B+. After Math for Elementary School Teachers 2, I had a B-. But I passed. I was done.
We let little girls repeat the narrative that they’re somehow less worthy of love and affection and applause and intelligence when they struggle with mathematics. We do it again and again and again and again until they’re not so little anymore. We, as teachers, prolong that same, toxic narrative when we exclusively celebrate those who can just look at the math and instantly understand instead of trying to understand where the facts fell apart.
We make it worse when we push our students off: off to another teacher, off to a tutor, off to another part of the massive, complicated bureaucracy and just let the system built to protect and serve the developing learner fail. The big STEAM push in the last five or six years is great; it encourages all students to learn. But when we neglect to think about those who have a harder time learning and having measurable success, it’s a lot harder to stomach what’s being shoved down all of our throats.
This semester, I’m back in math. It’s not about the content, it’s about the how. How can we teach our students to have confidence when they look at math? Studies are consistently showing that most students don’t feel good about the math that they do. They second-guess, or just struggle to stomach it altogether. “Math anxiety” rates are rising, and it takes a special kind of teacher to deal with it. Truthfully, I do think I can be a teacher. I think I can be a teacher because I struggle with math. I understand what it’s like to, just, not understand.
I get it. I may not be gifted, but I’m certainly smart.