x=y(1000/z)
Off the top of your head, what is the value of X if: y=7.5 and z=3
“How will my child ever learn how to do Algebra like this? You’re telling me he’s just going to learn this on his own, while having fun? No friggin way! How will my child learn this when I don’t know how to do it, I suck at math!”
You already know how. You do it every single day and you probably don’t even realize it. This is considered Elementary Algebra, and it’s as advanced as most students get in High School. Some people really jump on math, and are doing Calculus in their senior year of High School, but they are the exceptions to the rule. I like numbers, I’ve always found them to be fun, so I did well with Math in school. I’m drawn to projects and games that involve working with numbers. I work in a field where it is necessary to be good with numbers, and I love it. Do you know how often I need to remember Pythagorean Theorem? Never.
The preservation of knowledge is important. Preserving all of mankind’s knowledge inside my child’s brain isn’t important, nor will it ever fit, no matter how it’s crammed in. If my child decides he wants to be a Physicist, it will be because he loves Physics, and he will pursue it with a passion that will put him ahead of others in that field.
I have to convert numbers between binary and decimal from time to time. I do it all day long in my head though because I find it to be so much fun that I actually wear a watch that tells time in binary. I know, sorry ladies, I’m taken.
I’m not trying to make a point here about passion led learning though. People talk about how much they suck at math. I’ve even heard this as an excuse for continuing to force your children to go to public school: “I suck at math, I could never teach that to my kids!” If you suck at math, and you went to school, how is school-taught mathematics going to be different for your child?
I think what people fail to see is that they actually are good with numbers, even algebra, they just don’t realize it. They use it all day, every day, and fail to see it because they have been taught that Math is just something that they don’t get. They look at the above formula and go blank. These types of formulas are what people think of when they think about doing math, and that really is looking at numbers all wrong.
Stop thinking about Mathematics, and try to keep in the mindset that it’s just numbers. Using the above formula is a method for teaching people how to use numbers. For some people that formula makes a lot of sense. For other people it looks like complete gibberish, although that formula represents something that they probably do all the time and don’t realize it. If this is you, then you have probably taught yourself algebra from things you do in the real world, and it has happened so naturally that you didn’t even see it happen. It’s not that you are bad at math, it’s that the method in which Elementary Algebra was taught to you is not a method that works for you.
I used the above formula for a reason. It’s a formula that my 11 year old son has done in his head since he was probably 9, and he has no idea that he’s doing Algebra.
x=y(1000/z)
This is what happens when my son is playing Runescape, and needs another 1,000gp to buy something in the game. He needs to collect items in the game that he can then sell at the Grand Exchange. The value of items fluctuate from day to day, so while one day it might be most profitable to mine coal, the next day it might be better to gather Big Bones. He understands how much time it takes to gather different items, so with just a few minutes of looking at the current rates, he knows what he’s going to go and gather.
That’s it. He just did the above formula in his head. He doesn’t know that formula, but it doesn’t actually matter. Ever.
X=time in minutes it will take to accrue 1000gp
z=value of item
y=minutes it takes to gather z
Obviously, I like numbers. I didn’t learn about binary or hexadecimal, or even Cryptography in High School, I learned it on my own because I love numbers. I sucked at art class. I didn’t do art the way we were supposed to do art in our classroom. I still don’t understand how to match colors. I used to draw this guy with a mohawk who would always be giving somebody the finger. It was my sneaky way of giving my art teacher the finger. I have only recently come to realize that I like to draw, and it has taken my 11 year old son years to convince me that I don’t suck at art. Turns out, I don’t! I’m not Frank Frazetta or Alex Ross, but I’m not Bruce Schneier either, and that doesn’t stop me from noticing that it’s now 1100:100100 and I’m late for lunch!
TJ Phillips is the unschooling dad of Skylar 11, Milo 5, and Phoenix 2. He likes caffeine, beekeeping, and has a complete formula for buying groceries, at which stores, and for the cheapest amount of money: all saved in his head. He also happens to be my husband and soul mate.
loved this – am including it in my Monday Meanderings post and sharing w/ Eli (who also loves Runescape!)
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Nice!
Thanks!
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I don’t know Heather, I think you’ve got some serious competition here – its a good thing he is your DH. Actually, I am one of those that freezes up at the sight of numbers. I almost failed to be promoted to 11th grade because I had such a hard time with Algrebra. It was torture! I was scarred for life. In fact, my husband and I often joke that I will NOT be the one addressing math (if and when) it becomes necessary to do so with our children. I really enjoyed TJ’s perspective on this.
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Love this. Even if that formula did make me wince and almost close the tab.
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Heather Reply:
June 3rd, 2010 at 7:37 am
I know! I think just seeing that formula on my blog is giving me a headache! But damn he explains is so clearly.
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LOL- Ella was sitting with me while I read this and just said “Uhhh, why is that guys hand so close to my face?”.
Excellent post!
I hate that math was ruined for me. I was force fed the idea that *I* was the problem and it’s just not true. Math doesn’t come naturally to me at all, I freeze up trying to think about it, but it didn’t have to be that way. Nic has some of the same hangups after only 6 months in school! He still stalls when asked a specific question and yet he does math all the time.
I love the point about sending kids to the same place that taught you to hate math, so true!
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I already wrote this on Heather’s fb but thought I’d post it here, too, that as soon as I got to the Runescape part I called my daughter Jonna over and she read it and totally got it — and we’re both the sort to freeze up at the sight of an equation full of x’s and y’s. Thanks for the clarity, TJ!
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Yay TJ! I did try to figure out your formula in my head, I was one of those calculus in high school girls
I love your Runscape analogy to algebra, and I have witnessed a few of my kids pretty much master these concepts from video gaming, Runescape and then WoW. They are awesome at math in their heads, averaging, quick calculations…..
I can see that their interesting lives have provided them with all the math they need to succeed, so far!
Haven’t taught one iota of math to my kids, 15, 13, 11, 7 and 7…..although I guess I “could”
Great post. And love your humor
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Math!!! *yikes* I only started enjoying that word once I had been thinking about unschooling for the longest time…. how much I really do like puzzles, which is my path to math.
Lovely post.
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Off the top of my head: x is somewhere between 2100 and 3000, neighborhood of 2500, but I get your point! I love Mathematics but I find number manipulation (what school math tends to be mostly about) to be utterly boring. And I love Frank Frazetta!
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Great post, TJ! Thank you for taking the time to write it out!
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Fantastic, TJ. This really made me think of my own issues with math when I was younger. I never performed well in the formal school-based classes, but through my love of sports I was able to apply all sorts of math skills. I would lie awake at night thinking things like “If Guy Lafleur scored 55 goals in 72 games, how many would he have scored if he had played all 80?” I did this constantly, and I think it kept my brain “math happy” for so long that eventually I wanted to learn math in college. Now I’m a “practical math” geek . . . I may not know every formula, but I can do so much in my head that helps me get through any math-related problem I have. Great post, keep writing!
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Math made me cry in 5th grade and I never got over it. Calculations = yuck. But this post = yum! Thanks, TJ!
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I’m totally enjoying playing with numbers again…my daughter rubs off on me
and, despite the fact that I flunked algebra, I can totally understand it and use it! Even my daughter can…Sol (4) and Autumn (then 7, now 
were playing together and his action-figure was saying “E+O = 5″. Autumn told him that “you can’t add letters”. I briefly explained that you CAN use letters in formulas (gave some quick examples). She said she wanted to figure one out. I gave her some basic ones (like: if x + 15 = 25, what is x?). She easily got them all. She loves playing with numbers in her head (not on paper).
I’m not worried at all about “Math”–they are using numbers all the time and are expanding on their knowledge as needed in real-life situations. Great post TJ!!! We’ll have to check out Runescape. { Hello to Skylar, from Autumn
}
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this post is yet another example of how Unschooling Dads ROCK =) thoroughly enjoyed reading it & am so happy to now have a response to the people who say they could never teach their kids math
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Freaking brilliant! How can so much wisdom be coming from one house? And funny! What a totally amazing couple you guys are! I will be passing this post on to everyone I know, thanks!
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Great post!! Are you *sure* that wasn’t written by Dave?! Art teacher troubles and all…
I’m in a category that leans toward “gets the formula”, though I could *never* teach that to anyone, much less my kids. LOL I’m definitely sharing this around!! Thanks!!
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Excellent! Thank you so much. I suck at math, don’t do it well in my head and pretty much believe it’s because of the way it’s taught in school.
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Wow, thanks everybody for the awesome responses!
@Tara – Glad you stuck around and read past it, I was actually afraid that putting a formula right at the top might drive away some of the types of people I was thinking of when I wrote this!
@Frank – sadly Frazetta just passed away a few weeks ago
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Too funny, and totally logical. Why can’t everyone understand the concepts you have spelled out so clearly here?
By the way, where can I get one of those sexy watches for my husband?
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Heather Reply:
June 3rd, 2010 at 4:15 pm
@Amber – http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/watches/6a17/?cpg=froogle His is red LED’s though
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I inherited an inate ability with numbers from my father. Unfortunately, my new school noticed my aptitude and quickly bumped me up to a more advanced 7th grade math class focusing on ‘pre algebra’. Looking back, I can see this move as the beginning of a diminished love for math. Prior to my ‘promotion’ I enjoyed being among the first to grasp concepts and I had fun relating numbers to my other interests. After the bump, expectations were high, creating pressure to perform. The concepts were being thrust upon me before I had decided for myself that I needed more advanced math to stay stimulated. The fun in math was quickly lost. Based on the timetable I had been put on, I should have completed AP calculus by my senior year in HS. Instead, although I did make good grades, I stopped with advanced geometry. In college, calculus and physics were pure drudgery and my grades suffered.
I just can’t subject my kids to this type of experience. Long before I even had children, I promised myself I’d never ‘push’ them and would never be disappointed in their ‘career’ choice. If my kid decides digging ditches is the most fulfilling activity ever, so be it. If you love something, you will excel at it and if you excel at something, you will be deemed successful both in you own mind and by those oh so important societal standards.
BTW, by eliminating the decimals I figured 2497.5 and then suddenly realized the .333 I had cast aside for being too cumbersome calculated an addtional 2.4975. Thanks for reminding me tossing numbers around is fun.
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My son (who’s 6) recently BEAT the video game Plants vs. Zombies, which is basically using math algorithms at speed. What’s interesting is that the more time one spends unschooling, the more we “see” the hidden math and stop compartmentalizing it as something only experts do and then set down, formula-style, in books.
Kelly (who was good at math and has the engineering degree to prove it)
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Thanks for your post TJ! Watch out Heather!! As a math geek myself, I totally calculated the problem…dork. I switched out of engineering AFTER I took 5 engineering calculus classes!! yikes! We are all math geeks around here I guess – I love seeing K formulate his own complicated word problems…totally out of the blue. I guess it fascinates him. Some brains just work like that. I am completely convinced.
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I’ve seen my son do that Runescape thing. Didn’t realise there was algebra involved!
When I was at high school in London in the 1960s, they had what they called the General Certificate of Education (GCE) for every subject and I failed Maths twice, quite abysmally both times. Eight years after I left school, I decided a Maths GCE would be useful and studied the subject by correspondence course (Rapid Results College, still going apparently). Not only did I pass the exam with an A, I completed the entire syllabus in nine months, whereas at my high school it had been spread across four years.
So I think, as well as maths being something that’s naturally encountered in everyday life, perhaps it’s also worth realising that if anything does need to be learned formally it can most likely be done in a fraction of the time it takes in school. I’d say that’s more true now than ever.
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Love this. I’ve taught “no math” quilting workshops – nothing of the sort, of course, since you can’t create magnificent geometric patterns out of fabric and have the darned things all fit and lie flat without a whooooole lot of math… but its amazing how telling people “oh its not math, its just a little coloring and counting squares” opens them up to their very real abilities in that area.
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Love this post! I wrote something similar a few months ago:
http://openheartedlife.blogspot.com/2010/02/unschooling-math.html I did well in math in school – LOVED geometry, and proofs, and how things just fit together. I remember failing a test once because how I got my answers wasn’t the method that had been taught – you know, the whole “show your work” thing. Sadly, I didn’t think anything was wrong with the teacher or school, instead I felt ashamed and insecure!
Another article for folks looking for unschooling math info:
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201004/kids-learn-math-easily-when-they-control-their-own-learning and the one before that one is quite good, too.
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I also wrote a similar post at my blog. I work part-time as an SAT-prep teacher, and I realized that for all intents and purposes, I was about as good at “Math” as my students were. Yet when they brought me the toughest problems from their homework that they hadn’t been able to solve, I was generally able to figure them out without looking up the answer in the back of the book. In my post I write about why I can solve those problems and my students can’t, even though we have the exact same skill set. (Hint: it’s more about mind than math.)
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Heather Reply:
June 4th, 2010 at 11:44 am
These are GREAT comments and I’m really enjoying the shared links. We’ve been talking about math a lot in our house in the last couple days. At 32 years old, it truly makes my head hurt to think about school math.
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Great post! I love-love-love used book sales, and one day I found myself picking up books about logic and math and number problems and such. I thought how strange it was that I was drawn to them, because I was always an “I’m terrible at math” person. But I realized that once the pressure was off to *perform* I was actually quite curious about it. How wonderful to finally see that it’s such a fascinating realm. If only school didn’t ruin it by making it all about evaluation and hoop-jumping. *sigh*
Write more on this – I’ll read it!
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I enjoyed your post so much, I asked my algebra-phobic 17 year old to read it.
What’s nice is that we don’t have to hate math just because it tormented us in our own childhood. I’ve come to develop an appreciation for it as I’ve helped my kids understand it.
Algebra is still a mystery to me, but hey, someday…
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I love numbers too but not as much as you do. I love moving them around mostly in relation to money. Not that I am into stocks or anything either I just like saving, balancing my check book and adding and subtracting numbers with a pencil and paper. I once did a yearly business budget $900,000.00 with a yellow paper pad and a pencil. I did have a small pocket calculator to help with some of the multiplying but then would check the calculator by remultiplying it with the pencil and paper. It’s a game for me. I loved this post. Thanks,
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