So this article really irritated me today. Not because I really care one way or the other if parents and teachers feel kids are getting too much or not enough homework (though I was surprised that in general people felt the amount was either just right or not enough - somehow I figured this would just be an article about how the No Child Left Behind act was giving kids more homework than they could possibly deal with, etc. etc.) What irritated me was this quote:
When Cindy Gilpin's two children bring home math in Burlington, Mass., she tries to help, but she has a back-up plan for them: "Go find your father."It serves no purpose other than to bring to mind the short-lived Barbie that said "Math is hard." If they really wanted a useless paragraph like that, they could at least have scoured their polls for a family where it was the wife who was good at math and the husband sent them to mom for help. I mean seriously, do we need to perpuate the myth that men are good at math and women aren't? There are many, many women in the workplace who are not just good, but excellent at science and math - and there are many more women who chose not to be in the workplace in a technical field because of the stigmas associated with women who are good in these subjects. It's just one more example, I think, of irresponsible journalism to stick a paragraph like that into an article when the only purpose it could possibly serve is to reinforce the stereotype.
Altho I know that stereotype is out there, in my case, math is not a subject I am good at. I don't believe that boys are better than girls at math, and I don't think that article was really trying to state that. When it comes to math problems that I know I cannot help them with, I do refer my children to my husband. He was a Physics major in college and is a wiz at math in general. I do help my kids every day with homework, sometimes working with them for a couple hours each day until they grasp the concepts being taught. I don't feel I am driving home with my daughters that math is a "boys" forte. My oldest daughter is quite good at grasping math.
ReplyDeleteI do believe that society as a whole is no longer imposing that sterotype on our children. At least not where I live. I can only comment on what I am exposed to obviously. But being somewhat of a feminist, I work very hard at nurturing all my kids aptitudes no matter if they seem "male" or "female" by society's standards.
Interesting article tho!
That's a good other perspective, Beth, thanks. :) I get my toes stepped on easily on this topic, so it just frustrates me that they had to put that little paragraph in there, cause if you skip it, the whole article is still really good. But for all of that, my mom used to do send me to dad for math help too.
ReplyDeleteMy mother was better in math than my father because she could help me see it in terms I could understand. Dad would stare at the problem for fifteen minutes, and after I while I knew better than to ask him! :)
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