The Mathematics of success= - Maths or + Maths?
This newsreport recently caught my eye. It talks about a proposal moved by the ministry of youth affairs and sports to make mathematics an optional subject after Class 8
I cannot claim to have any expertise to be able to comment on the decision, hence shall refrain from doing the same. The following post is less about the government’s decision, which I understand is going to incite opinions that are divided on the issue, in this post I am merely sharing my own tryst with the subject during my school life and the consequences, that I believe resulted thereof.
Without mincing words, let it be known that I was what could be referred to as being ‘average’ in Maths. It was a subject that always evoked panic, fear and also feelings of inferiority – as proficiency in the subject was supposedly inevitable to be considered ‘intelligent’ and hence if one was ‘poor in maths’ meant one could be relegated forever into the ‘not-so-bright’ breed. This perceived relationship between excelling in maths and excelling in life perhaps propelled me to fight tooth and nail with what was a lack of a ‘natural flair’ for the subject and a veneration for it dominated most of my student life (and it was the fear of this ignominy of being deemed 'unintillegent' that fuelled acceptable performance in the subject more than a natural comfort in the it). On hindsight, I never enjoyed maths but I believed strongly enough that one just had to be good at mathematics to make it anywhere significantly in life. End result – the focus of your life becomes something you want to be better at (hence are at most ‘ok’ in it), instead of being something you are inherently good at (and can potentially excel in).
This obsession with ‘proving’ one is good at mathematics or anything else for that matter could be partly self-created, driven by aspirations to model oneself on someone else who, for example, excels at that. Partly responsible could be a not-so-sensitive school teacher who could explicitly or implicitly hint that a student was ‘slow’ as proficiency in maths was not upto desired levels (sensitive, impressionable children, whose need for approval is very high, are especially susceptible to this). And mostly responsible is the general social scenario in our country where the more lucrative and high-profile jobs go to the engineering and/or MBA breed of professionals, a fundamental requirement of the engineering course being proficiency in mathematics (and in turn, 70% of MBAs are from engineering backgrounds, followed by economics, science and commerce, rarely arts.). Non-traditional career options that emanate from an aptitude, for instance, in the liberal arts, natural sciences or even those who possess non-academic talents like art, music, sports are considered neither lucrative nor worthwhile a student’s time and effort.
As a result of the above, what we achieve is a person who is at best average in what he does. Marcus Buckingham and Curt W. Coffman of Gallup in their book ‘First, Break All the Rules’ share an insight which they have culled during their extensive interaction with successful corporate managers, of course their finding is more aimed at the corporate arena, but in principle, is true of people in general. They say :
People don't change that much.
Don't waste time trying to put in what was left out.
Try to draw out what was left in.
That is hard enough.
In essence, what their philosophy states is that “…try to help each person become more and more of who he already is.”
The point that this post is trying to make is that an archaic education system that defines excellence in a rather uni-dimensional manner fails to tap the potential of the individual (and in turn the huge human resource pool that exists in India which is assumed to be our greatest asset as of today). And the answer does not lie in a solution as simplistic as making a subject/s optional (young students are most often driven by reasons other than a heightened awareness of their own strengths in making academic choices). What is required instead is an innovative system that is able to identify, encourage and nurture a student’s inherent strengths. It could mean making maths optional, or making history/social sciences optional - the suggested approach being one which makes one at the end of it, feel comfortable about one’s intrinsic talents and utilize them favorably.
I cannot claim to have any expertise to be able to comment on the decision, hence shall refrain from doing the same. The following post is less about the government’s decision, which I understand is going to incite opinions that are divided on the issue, in this post I am merely sharing my own tryst with the subject during my school life and the consequences, that I believe resulted thereof.
Without mincing words, let it be known that I was what could be referred to as being ‘average’ in Maths. It was a subject that always evoked panic, fear and also feelings of inferiority – as proficiency in the subject was supposedly inevitable to be considered ‘intelligent’ and hence if one was ‘poor in maths’ meant one could be relegated forever into the ‘not-so-bright’ breed. This perceived relationship between excelling in maths and excelling in life perhaps propelled me to fight tooth and nail with what was a lack of a ‘natural flair’ for the subject and a veneration for it dominated most of my student life (and it was the fear of this ignominy of being deemed 'unintillegent' that fuelled acceptable performance in the subject more than a natural comfort in the it). On hindsight, I never enjoyed maths but I believed strongly enough that one just had to be good at mathematics to make it anywhere significantly in life. End result – the focus of your life becomes something you want to be better at (hence are at most ‘ok’ in it), instead of being something you are inherently good at (and can potentially excel in).
This obsession with ‘proving’ one is good at mathematics or anything else for that matter could be partly self-created, driven by aspirations to model oneself on someone else who, for example, excels at that. Partly responsible could be a not-so-sensitive school teacher who could explicitly or implicitly hint that a student was ‘slow’ as proficiency in maths was not upto desired levels (sensitive, impressionable children, whose need for approval is very high, are especially susceptible to this). And mostly responsible is the general social scenario in our country where the more lucrative and high-profile jobs go to the engineering and/or MBA breed of professionals, a fundamental requirement of the engineering course being proficiency in mathematics (and in turn, 70% of MBAs are from engineering backgrounds, followed by economics, science and commerce, rarely arts.). Non-traditional career options that emanate from an aptitude, for instance, in the liberal arts, natural sciences or even those who possess non-academic talents like art, music, sports are considered neither lucrative nor worthwhile a student’s time and effort.
As a result of the above, what we achieve is a person who is at best average in what he does. Marcus Buckingham and Curt W. Coffman of Gallup in their book ‘First, Break All the Rules’ share an insight which they have culled during their extensive interaction with successful corporate managers, of course their finding is more aimed at the corporate arena, but in principle, is true of people in general. They say :
People don't change that much.
Don't waste time trying to put in what was left out.
Try to draw out what was left in.
That is hard enough.
In essence, what their philosophy states is that “…try to help each person become more and more of who he already is.”
The point that this post is trying to make is that an archaic education system that defines excellence in a rather uni-dimensional manner fails to tap the potential of the individual (and in turn the huge human resource pool that exists in India which is assumed to be our greatest asset as of today). And the answer does not lie in a solution as simplistic as making a subject/s optional (young students are most often driven by reasons other than a heightened awareness of their own strengths in making academic choices). What is required instead is an innovative system that is able to identify, encourage and nurture a student’s inherent strengths. It could mean making maths optional, or making history/social sciences optional - the suggested approach being one which makes one at the end of it, feel comfortable about one’s intrinsic talents and utilize them favorably.
posted by Chandni Dendukuri at 6:26 PM
4 Comments:
I totally and completely agree with you. However, I still believe that maths should be mandatory till class XII. I was not a maths lover myself, but after all those "reading intensive" history & literature exams, solving maths problems was fun. Then, maths (including statistics) is also useful in other disciplines such as social sciences & commerce.
But I do agree, if you are not good at maths, it can be quite a pain in the neck. As my friend put it very honestly to his home tutor after his Class XII exams "aaj ke baad maths is ghar ke andar nahin ghusegi"
Completely agree with you.
In my observation there is no significant correlation between "doing well at math papers" and intelligence. You are right when you mention this is a unidimensional measure, and anything unidimensional is shallow, and not worthy of pride. On the other hand, someone with a flair for the artistic to me has a style of intelligence which is far more respectable. Thus Salman Rushdie, Marquez, Vikram Seth et al are my yardstick for intelligence - I am sure they excelled at Math exams, as well, but that was just a small part of their overall genius. I am not sure the Indian education system can ever identify genius of this sort and promote it...
The other point is about the approach to education in India, which is something we have discussed for ages, haven't we? This is one of the issues that appears every now and then and reminds us that India hasn't really shone as much as we thought it has. Indian education really needs deep introspection, and I am not purely talking about its spread or the quality of execution - I am talking about the very principles that the system is based on.
And yet again I am left thinking I should be the one doing something about it, being one of the priviliged few with the wherewithal to actually make it happen... Sigh...
Hi
I just came across your blog from blogpur.blogspot.com, where you had commented about Black!
This is a terrific blog. I really enjoy reading it. I will put on you my blogroll.
As for the quotation from Alice in Wonderland, I really like the one:
"Why, said the dodo, the best way to explain it is to do it!"
"70% of MBA's are from engineering background..."
This is perhaps because of the unidirectional ability of engineering. It gives you a strong technical degree for your undergraduation, then it lets you go into other fields. The reverse cannot be done. A person who has studied arts or commerce in their undergraduate degree cannot suddenly do an ME.
"This perceived relationship between excelling in maths and excelling in life perhaps propelled me to fight tooth and nail with what was a lack of a ‘natural flair’ for the subject and a veneration for it dominated most of my student life (and it was the fear of this ignominy of being deemed 'unintillegent' that fuelled acceptable performance in the subject more than a natural comfort in the it)."
That is very well written and you have captured the psyche of many Indians. Personally I actually like maths inherently but I can see why you said the above statement.
This is a very well written post!
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