Eighth grade honors algebra......it has kicked Kate and now Mommy in the teeth (and elsewhere, but I try to keep things PG). She just doesn't get it. Today is her first semester exam. She (and I) studied..... I would estimate conservatively 15 hours from Thursday of last week until today. I expect her grade to be perhaps a 60. The problems in math are deeply rooted and go way back for Kate. Her first and only elementary school B was in 3rd grade math. What I wouldn't give for a B today.
Last night, it all came tumbling down. Five years of fraction frustration festered and festooned into full on mother/daughter war. As we worked our way through the chapter 5 linear equations.....can you say y=mx+b, the raised voices became all out shouts; the beautiful eyes first welled up with water, then emptied into a steady flow of crocodile tears. From somewhere in the innermost recesses of my home I heard Drew singing "Kum Ba Yah." I am not making this up. I suppose I, like Drew, hoped The Good Lord might 'come by here.'
Kate told me again she was sorry she wasn't a perfect child, that she is sorry she isn't as smart as Drew. I'm just sorry she has this math mental block. Is it at least partly attributable to effort or a lack thereof? Absolutely. But, I think part of it is truly heredity. I kept hoping at some point the light would come on and the algebraic anomaly would fall into place. Five years after her first math blip....that of the 3rd grade variety.....I am still waiting. And here is Kate, demonstrating in yet another way how very much like her mom she is. For the mother of this eighth grader, math was a constant battle of wills. From my middle school math teacher who rapped my knuckles with a ruler as she passed my desk when she noted incorrect calculations to collegiate mathematics at Clemson, I have always found numbers both puzzling and confusing. Somehow I found a way to make decent grades, but now, 20 years later (okay, okay, for those counting it is probably closer to 40 years.....I've already shared my difficulty with numbers), trying to remember what and how I did it.....well let's just say Santa will be bringing Kate a tutor. And I kick myself that I didn't find one sooner. Teaching one you love so much....one for whom you want so much.....well, it's not always the best idea.
So as Drew finishes his soulful and sad rendition of Kum Ba Yah and I literally close the books on my attempts to determine the equation of a line that passes through such and such a point, we will hold our collective breaths and say a little prayer that from somewhere, Kate finds a flash of understanding and a passing performance on her exam.
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