American students are plagued with the belief that math is a talent. In one study comparing American students with Japanese students, American kids gave up on a problem after 30 seconds. The Japanese students, by contrast, struggled for an hour to solve a . That鈥檚 120 times as long!
鈥.鈥
This Japanese proverb might have something to do with this enormous difference. The proverb means that with patience and perseverance, anything can be accomplished. The outsider鈥檚 pessimistic interpretation might be twofold: sitting doesn鈥檛 accomplish anything. Sitting doing nothing is boring. And indeed, perseverance happens when the glamor of novelty has worn off.
There is no glamor in my students鈥 successes. There is no lightbulb moment in which suddenly ignorance is replaced by vast understanding. It鈥檚 a process of slow realization, that patience and perseverance does in fact work. My student came to me at the beginning of the year in Algebra II with the same opinions of himself as a multitude of others. 鈥淚鈥檓 bad at math.鈥 鈥淚鈥檓 a bad test-taker.鈥 These weren鈥檛 excuses, but deeply embedded ideas about himself. They were dangerous too, because they drove him to a place of sadness and defeat. And, worst of all (to me the teacher) they drove him to (gasp) not do his homework!
鈥淧atience is bitter but its fruit is sweet.鈥
My student鈥檚 path to success was one of patience. There was no magical cure. The solution was plain as day, and just as mundane. For him, the solution was to do his homework. That鈥檚 it. He would come to class, having looked over the homework problems, only to tell me he couldn鈥檛 do them. 鈥淒id you try?鈥 I would say. 鈥淲ell鈥︹ he would respond. Every day I would remind him that math is a skill, not a talent. Every day that he hadn鈥檛 done his homework, I reminded him that practice makes perfect. And slowly but surely, he started doing his homework on a regular basis. And guess what? His tests improved remarkably. He began speaking up in class more and more often. His confidence in math increased. 听
It鈥檚 amazing what doing your homework can do. But of course I say that, I鈥檓 the teacher.