What follows here is an actual email I sent to my oldest daughter's teacher tonight. I realize that she will probably be really pissed at me for posting this- but I hope that someday she can see beyond the obvious and get over herself enough to really embrace how much I truly believe in her and know that she is absolutely bound for greatness. Her own greatness.
Dear ****,
I am writing to request that a change be made to Ellie’s math facts log. I am requesting that for the time being, we suspend the log- that we do not have her record the times and use the log that has been provided. I would like her to continue doing the math fact pages, as quickly as she can, but I’d like to try not recording them for the time being. This request comes after several long conversations and lots of crying. It is my hope that Ellie and I can work together to get her over this hurdle, and have her come out of this successful in knowing her math facts. Pull up a chair…let me explain…
About two weeks ago, Ellie was given an assignment by her piano teacher to teach herself, “The Entertainer.” She thought it was hard, and was annoyed that she ‘couldn’t get it.’ So she got really mad and complained about how it’s in the so-called ‘easy’ book, but yet she couldn’t seem to get it. She stomped around a lot and said she didn’t know how she was supposed to get this difficult song. She was really angry and wasted A LOT of time and energy being mad about it. I told her that it is one of my ALL-TIME favorite songs (is truly in my top 50 favorite songs ever!) and that maybe she could learn it and play it for me as a Mother’s Day gift. I left her alone to be mad. She continued being angry and then one day just decided she was going to do it. Without a lot of fanfare, she went into the music room and started. At first she stumbled…she had to keep trying…she tried the left hand…made mistakes…pounded the piano a few times…got frustrated…shouted a lot…and eventually it came together. She had to repeat it and repeat it and repeat it. All of the sudden, after several hours (not all at once) it sounded amazingly like the ‘actual song.’ It was beautiful. This success gave her the energy and confidence to perfect it- she listened to the CD of the song and has now even learned to play the song with lots of emotion. She is very proud of this accomplishment- and she should be- because she attacked it with fervor- even though she didn’t think she could. Success is sweet.
So tonight we were sitting at the kitchen table and she was working on a math fact page. She became frustrated quickly, watching the stop watch app go dark on the iphone, knowing she was ‘over’ time, but not nearly finished. She stumbled, she flipped her hair and became very, very agitated. She got mad and flopped her head on the table in disgust. “I can’t do this, I just can’t do this,” she exclaimed, tears welling up behind her gigantic blue eyes. I could feel her frustration and pain. As a parent, I want to alleviate her suffering, but I also need to make sure I don’t simply remove her obstacles, as she needs to learn how to surmount them. I think we needed a new way to tackle this, or at the very least, a new way of thinking about it.
A few days ago I jokingly bought flash cards at Target on clearance for $.28. She was really angry about it. She loathes flash cards. I didn’t say much, and as tempting as it was, I did not put them in her Easter basket. We sat at the table tonight and I pulled out the 7s and the 8s, the ones she said she just doesn’t know. We went over them several times. She started to cry. “Why can’t I do this? Why am I such a dumb- ***?” (she didn’t actually say the expletive, but told me she wanted to). I told her that she is not stupid and she can’t refer to herself that way. She said she is embarrassed by this. She looks at the chart and she just hates that it makes her feel so dumb. Why can’t I just do this?, she asked. We talked about the piano piece. I asked her why she did that- why did she tackle it even though it was hard? She said, “Well, Mom, I care about THAT.” So then it clicked. She has to care about these math facts. Through her sobs she explained how she hates these ‘stupid math facts’ and how all the other kids knew this stuff in 2nd grade, and she just hates that she has to do it. I took the math binder and threw it on the floor. I said, “Ok, that’s it. You’re done. No more logs.” She was stunned. I asked her how she memorized all the bones in the body in 1st grade, but yet math facts are escaping her in 7th grade. She told me that she cared about the bones- “...that was interesting,” she told me. I told her that if there were no more logs- no more chastising- no more bad words in her head- could she care about it enough to just open up her mind and JUST memorize them? I asked her to think about how you look at a painting, and you can’t really see it…so you squint…but you still can’t quite get it…so you back up…you ‘loosen’ your mind and let it flow. Suddenly, it becomes much more clear. I asked her to try that with the math facts. She cried about how much time she has wasted. That she looks at the many minutes listed in the columns of the logs and how much of her life she has ‘lost’ by doing this, but STILL not getting them. I told her to let it go. I said that I wanted her to just loosen up her brain and let herself memorize them. Stop trying to think it through, you KNOW that 6 times 7 is 42… just trust that you don’t have to calculate them…you know that they are correct. Forget trying to rationalize them- just allow yourself to remember them. You don’t need to add 6 more to 6 times 6 which is 36 to get 42… just accept it. Plain and simple- just repeat them. We spent about 50 minutes going over the 8s. She nailed them. She is finally confident. She amazed herself. I told her that we would devote an hour, or whatever amount of time was needed to doing this for each one. No logs, no timers, none of that stress. Let’s just repeat them until they come out cleanly. I told her that she still has to take the math facts sheets, and she still needs to be patient with herself, but she needs to loosen her brain to allow the facts to just permeate her memory. She tasted a small bit of success tonight. She told me that she likes math- she doesn’t want to miss out on the ‘smarter’ math and science in high school because she can’t get these. She wants to do the higher level math. I do think she is capable of that as well. I reiterated that she needs to just memorize these. I reminded her that many of her mistakes in her algebra and also in the fractions unit were arithmetic- that she needs to remove that as a factor so she can just concentrate on the ‘good stuff’.
I told her a story that I don’t know I had ever shared with her in such detail. I explained how I had to take remedial math- arithmetic in college. I told her the story of how I had failed that class twice- I had to take it a total of three times. I hated myself. I hated every math teacher I ever had. I hated my parents. I hated the graduate assistant who was collecting a paycheck just by giving me the weekly test- not teaching me a damn thing. I hated everyone, but mostly myself. I remember failing the class and going back to my dorm room and crying into the pillow. I remember feeling like I was going to quit. I couldn’t do it. I simply couldn’t do it. I could write fantastic papers, I could speak French, I could win scholarships in regional and statewide debates, I could do all of those things, but I couldn’t do this math. I had no other option than to quit. As I sat up on my bed, I remember thinking, “Huh? What? I am going to quit college because of a stupid arithmetic class? Uh, NO.” I had to do this. I didn’t have to like it. I didn’t have to want to do it, but I HAD TO DO IT. And I did. It wasn’t easy, but I did it. Not for the grad student, not for my parents, but for me. When it was all said and done, I did it. FOR ME.
So tonight began a new way of thinking. I reminded her of the P!nk song, “F’in Perfect.” She loves the song and the video. The first time we both saw the video together it made us both cry. How could someone hurt herself – how could someone hate herself so much? How dreadfully sad. In the song, she talks ‘about changing the voices in your head- make them like you instead.’ I made her promise me that she would try REALLY hard to let go of all the angst that this has caused and start anew. Forget the ‘lost time’ and all the tried attempts, just start again. Tonight. I explained to her that I expect her to do this- I am not getting her ‘out of it.’ She has to want it, and for the first time ever, I think she really does. So it began. She went to bed knowing the 8s- really knowing them. She said she was afraid that she’d forget them overnight. I said well, if you do, we’ll do them again tomorrow. It’s ok. You’ll get it. Just like the piano song. I am so proud of her, I KNOW she can do it, and for the first time, I think she finally thinks she can too. That will make all the difference.
Sorry this is so long, but after all she has been through with these math facts; the bribery, the flash cards, the threatening, the math sheets, the computer programs, the silly math song CD that she hated, all the conferences that it has been discussed, I think I needed to explain. I hope this will be ok in the classroom. Please let me know what you think. Thanks so much for your patience and understanding. We appreciate you greatly. Take care, Carol Hilty
