Shalinee Sharma in Time Magazine:
Across the nation, kids are heading back to school. It’s an exciting time. I remember both the joy and the nervousness that came with my now twin 13-year-olds’ first starting school. In fact, one day in particular stands out. I was rushing to the school, late as usual. As I hustled up four flights of stairs to their classroom, another parent interrupted my thoughts and started talking. “She’s like me, basically,” the woman said. “She’s just not a math kid. We are creative types.” I looked up, startled; I couldn’t hide my reaction. Here was a mom, already ruling out an entire world of possibilities for her child whose education had barely begun. Imagine if we treated reading in the same manner.
The experience I had at pick-up is far from unique. As a math learning expert, I understand how deeply ingrained the myth of the math kid is in our education system. We classify or sort kids based on our perception of their varied, inborn math ability—”math kids” on one side, everyone else on the other.
This view ignores the science that says all humans have an inherent number sense and ability to think mathematically from the start. In fact, scientists have proven that babies and toddlers show and develop numeracy—the ability to understand and work with numbers—early on. Babies only a few days old can distinguish two from three.
More here.
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