Here is my quick answer…many people are afraid of math because they grow up being unsuccessful and hating “school” math and the education system as a whole isn’t concerned with whether or not students enjoy learning.

A few weeks ago a colleague asked “why are people afraid of math?”. It was a good question and it was asked sincerely.  People in our society regularly say they are “not a math person” or freely admit “I was never good at math” or, my favorite, “you taught middle school math, bless you.” Others are regularly impressed with people who are good at math.  As if we are somehow smarter than other people because we teach and/or understand math (or at least we seem to). The question has plagued me for several weeks, and it is the reason why I finally decided to write some of my thoughts down to share.

For a moment I’d like to share that I do not believe myself more qualified than any other math education professional to write about the teaching and learning of mathematics.  In fact, many of the ideas that I share are those of others which I will give credit where credit is due.  I truly stand on the shoulders of those around me and those who came before.  That being said, perhaps the way the ideas are shared might be exactly what and how you need to hear them.

As for the question at hand: Why are people afraid of math?  Truly I don’t believe people are afraid of math. A fear of math is just the manifestation of our fear of failure.  No one wants to seem inadequate or feel like a failure at anything.  In fact we naturally avoid things we regularly fail at. I can’t think of a person that would willingly continue to try something they have been made to feel a failure at for years.  When we reduce mathematics to sets of skills and procedures through instructional methods like “I do, we do, you do” and strict sequential following of a textbook (just to name a couple), we convey to students the ideas that if you aren’t good at the procedures and don’t “master” the skills then you must not be good at math.

If we accept this as a possible premise, then the real question is why do people feel a failure in their relationship with math.  While there are many possible reasons, my thoughts continue to return to the role that our educational system plays in our society’s dislike for mathematics.  We must acknowledge that most of the mathematics we stress in elementary and middle school is a by-product of an age prior to the ubiquitous availability of computers.  And yes that thing we call a phone in our pocket, that is a computer.

The key idea here is that young students bring an exceptional intuitive knowledge of mathematics to elementary school.  Simply reference the research and success of Cognitively Guided Instruction in grades TK-5. Our pacing guides, textbooks, and the breaking down of knowledge into unconnected procedural steps leads children to believe that math is nothing more than memorizing these unconnected procedural skills.  When children fall behind the pace set by districts, schools, and textbooks they inevitably begin to construct a negative relationship with mathematics. Combine all of this with grading practices that do little to convey what children truly know, ability grouping in elementary, tracking in middle and high school, a focus on speed and memorization, and intensive intervention and all you get is a large group of children that feel like failures at mathematics. These practices and programs play a major role in producing the fear and disdain that so many people have for mathematics.

The truth is that we need a drastic change in the way that we teach mathematics and many other subjects.  To quote one of my favorite mathematicians, Dan Finkel, “we can’t afford to misuse mathematics to create passive rule followers.”  We live in an age of technology that provides unprecedented access to information.  We have to begin to teach as if these tools exist.  We must stop ignoring these tools, stop being frustrated by students who use them to work around our assignments.  We have to truly change our instruction to provide more authentic learning for students. 

How do we do this?  It begins by recognizing that our personal understanding of mathematics needs to be deeper than it currently might be.  We can also move toward more humanizing practices by standing up and saying, “I have more to learn about the openness of mathematics.”  Most importantly we can begin to shift our instruction by deeply believing that a textbook is not the solution, it is a resource at best. If we truly believe this we must then ask, what should I be using/doing. And thus begins your journey of learning and exploration. What a wonderful journey it will be!

We have to focus on teaching students to see relationships and connections in mathematics.  This cannot be done through direct instruction alone.  We have to recognize that when we provide answers to basic questions or solution pathways prior to student exploration, we rob students of true learning. Essentially we need to redefine what we want from math education.  Algorithms, procedures, skills, and improved standardized test results cannot be the sum of our ambition. 

I will write more on this topic in future posts with specific teacher recommendations.  For now I challenge districts, sites, and teachers to want more for our elementary age students than simply doing well on SBAC tests, covering required content, and automaticity of basic facts. These goals will not lead to increased numbers of students seeking STEM fields and it will not rehumanize mathematics for our students of color. 

And middle school teachers, your students knowing their basic facts will not fix the issues in your math classroom and will not make it significantly easier for students to learn your grade level content.  I used to believe it would but I was wrong. If you do believe this to be true, give them a calculator, and see if that solves the problem because it should but it won’t.

To be clear, I completely recognize the benefit of students gaining automaticity with facts. It can make future math easier to understand but this should not be done by sacrificing understanding of the operations.  Students should understand how the operations behave and how to derive facts they have trouble automatizing. Timed tests and rote practice are not achieving the goal we hoped and they are anxiety producers for students.  The fear and anxiety that these practices  foster in students is not a trade off that is worth making for any reason.  

Curiosity should be cultivated first and centered always!