Ok I have to soap box for a moment...

I’m in the need for a small rant, and I’m going to try my hardest to rant quickly and then be done.

So here goes…
When did it become ok for people to be bad at math? People, professional people, will laughingly joke about how they can barely balance their checkbooks to anybody who will listen. Parents walk into conferences and make the comment, “Oh, I was never good at math either,” as if math ability is somehow a genetic trait. Teachers and administrators wrinkle up their noses when they hear that I’m a math teacher and will say how much they disliked math in school. I wonder how many of these same people would be just as happy to let the world know that they have trouble reading or never learned to read at all.

I would like people to realize just how much their attitudes are picked up by the people around them. I found this great article about how female elementary teachers really influence their female students’ attitudes about math and the young girls’ math abilities. When I read this I considered how I portray myself as a female math teacher, but also the side comments that I make about other subject areas. I hope that I have not negatively influenced my students about other classes and I’m going to try to be more conscience of what I say in the future.

Rant’s officially over, thanks for reading.