Mason  🏃‍♂️ ✂️

If you genuinely believe children will turn into adults who cannot add or multiply because their parents let them skip a half year of Zoom calls, I think your intuitions are absolutely absurd. School stunts these poor kids. Look at a 1st grade math curriculum. Christ.

Actually spend some time with 6 year olds; tell me they can't learn all that and more inside of a month. Learn some actual math concepts (you likely know none; you know operations). Try teaching them to a child. Read the Mathematician's Lament. Stop parroting stupid tropes.

Ouch! I have a degree in engineering - I won't claim to remember every last bit, but I do know a few math concepts. I work with kids down to age 7 (although my fiancee teaches ages 5/6) and kids absolutely internalise ideas about being bad at things at that age.

Didn't intend my original tweet to be particularly aggressive, so apologies if it came off that way. I'm sure I agree with lots of criticisms you have of the school system (different country, probably similar drawbacks). I also worry that parents don't understand fully...

...which bits of the curriculum they can cut out without it impacting their kids down the line. Kids who get the idea that they're bad at maths carry it with them - the idea that learning history somehow makes up for that seems like a confirmation of that lack of understanding.

You're not being aggressive. I'm being aggressive. There is no way for me to convey through text how disturbing I find it when someone anywhere near child education indicates they'd rather see a parent force an unhappy early education than let their child learn what they like.

Do you know why so many children and adults hate math? Nothing about it is inherently aversive, though it is tricky— in large part because it's taught as a utility kit rather than an area of study. Few people know any real math. It's force, leading to trauma, netting mathphobes.

Wouldn't disagree with you (and I loved maths)! I would add that a lot of people dislike math because they believe they are bad at it, and THAT comes (often) from falling behind at some point and not catching up.