Math Phobia

There are a few dreams that are said to be dreamed by everyone; being naked in public and falling are two of them. I've dreamed about being out in public in my underwear, but this is not much of a nightmare, as I have no modesty when it comes to nakedness. I've dreamed that I can fly, but I've never dreamed that I am falling.

The dream I have over and over again is another that many people have: I'm back in school (either high school or college) and it's the end of the semester and I realize that I've cut a particular class so often that I'm hopelessly behind--sometimes I don't even know what period the class falls in, or where the classroom is. Invariably, that class is math.

I remember watching astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson giving a talk about the demotion of Pluto (which I've written about on this blog) and he talked about knowing that there is something out there if its gravity affects the orbit of another planet. He said something like, "So we did the math..." That statement grabbed me--he could do the math, but I couldn't in a million years. It's like telling me to eat Canterbury Cathedral. It's impossible.

There is a condition called math anxiety, or math phobia, that many people suffer from. I think I'm one of them. I'm pretty good with simple procedures, like addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. In fact, I can do some of these in my head rather quickly. But anything more complex, and my brain starts to shut down. It may be a left brain/right brain thing, or it may be that I've conditioned myself from childhood to shun higher mathematical concepts.

The first trouble I had in math was geometry. I remember in 9th grade being called to the blackboard to do a proof (I remember the word, but I forget what is involved). I would stare at the board as if it were the Rosetta Stone, not understanding a thing. In 10th grade, I actually flunked a quarter of geometry, the only F I ever got. Fortunately, that school system only required two years of math, and I was done with it.

In college, I had to take only one semester of math, and it was a basic "Math for Idiots" class. It was like a review of my life in math--it started out with basic elementary school math, got into algebra, which I can get through, and then by the end of the semester got into trigonometry and calculus, which are impossible for me. I passed the class, and that was it for me.

So my dreams are not accurate--I never cut math class. My bete noir in college was French. I never took a language in high school, so I had to take one year of it in college. I passed the first semester, but it took me three tries to get through the second. I would start it, and then get baffled (maybe learning a language and math use similar parts of the brain), start cutting, and then get so hopelessly behind that I would have to drop the class. My last class in college was in the summer, an intensive class of French, and I finally got through it.

There has always been the plaintive cry of students like me: "Why do we need to take math?" Of course, why do we need to take anything, but in junior high I had a teacher who had a good answer--learning math helps you learn how to think. Of course, in that class I lost my math book. Maybe it was a subconscious thing.

Today I don't have to take a math class, and I can use a calculator. I still struggle with figuring out percentages of things. I hear the word algorithm tossed around, though I have no idea what it means. I'm glad there are people who are good at math--it makes life easier for all of us--and am dismayed that our schools are lagging in the teaching of it. I wish there was something I could do to help, but when it comes to math, I don't know nuthin'.