Young people are so often taught to think in binary terms: you’re either one thing or the other

I started that paragraph talking about language. A great love of mine. But I ended up talking about numbers. Another great love of mine. For some, this would be a contradiction. How can you love language and numbers? How can you be a poet and a mathematician? Young people are so often taught to think in binary terms: you’re either one thing or the other. You’re good at Mathematics or you’re good at English. Girls are better at this. Boys are better at that.

I’m grateful to say that I managed to swerve the binary brainwash. I was introduced to a range of subjects and activities before I even got to school. I loved writing poetry. I loved Maths. I loved football. I loved ballet. I loved baking. I loved kick-boxing. I loved trying everything. And there were no binaries to be seen. Furthermore, when I got to high school age I chose to go to a girls’ school so once again the idea of binaries went out the window. I was exposed to all types of people in that environment. It just so happened that we all identified as female.

The binaries we often experience when it comes to subjects such as Maths and English are so often associated with another one – the gender binary. Copious studies have told us that girls are not pursuing careers in the fields of science and mathematics. Schemes like STEM have been set up to tackle this problem. In principle I am happy that STEM exists. However, in both intention and application it adheres to the same binary that it attempts to solve.

1. Girls are bad at mathematics
2. Boys are good at mathematics
3. Girls needs schemes to help them get better careers
4. Boys do not need schemes to help them get better careers
5. STEM subjects are more important than other subjects
6. We need more girls in those topics to boost the economy (as opposed to considering how those fields will actually benefit from having more diverse contributions)

In my view, we need to change the approach if we want to see real change.

the gender gap for attainment is non-existent in terms of actual abilities being gendered

A recent article by Katherine Wu at NOVA¹ stated that results of research into subject attainment and the gender gap are reported in a way that’s misleading. In actual fact, the results from over 60 countries around the world show that the difference between male and female mathematics attainment is pretty insignificant. Furthermore, since girls are ‘seen’ to excel in more verbal and language-based subjects at an earlier age, they are led to believe that, in comparison or simply by assumption, they are bad at mathematics. The binary brainwash.

Wu’s article was a pleasure to read because it said all the stuff that I have found to be true from my experience of training as a mathematics teacher (shout out to my boss, Suzie, for sending it to me). It essentially concludes that the gender gap for attainment is non-existent in terms of actual abilities being gendered. Instead, the gap we see is a product of poor socialization, poor confidence and misinterpreted statistics!

I want to deliver fun creative maths lessons that feel like poetry workshops

I’ll always remember when I was in a primary school in Levenshulme as part of my teacher training. During a lesson I was astounded by the way that socialization and gendered expectation had, at such a young age, already made a mark on the students’ learning. As girls we are taught to be vulnerable and express our feelings. Many boys are taught to be confident and not show signs of weakness. I went around the classroom helping the students with their fractions. All of the girls who were struggling were happy to say, “Miss I’m struggling.” “I don’t understand it.” “I’m not sure if I’ve got the right answer.” Immediately I was able to help. They got the answer and moved onto the next activity. All of the boys who were struggling didn’t tell me. I could see that they didn’t have a clue. However, when I asked them if they needed help the response was, “Nah Miss I’m good at this.” “I know what I’m doing.” “I’ve got the answer.” Even after I had explained that they hadn’t. It broke my heart that these 7-year-old boys already felt that they needed to perform this false sense of security, and that it was having a detrimental effect on their learning. They didn’t know the answer. They couldn’t move on.

as all boys did so I tried to do
Inspired by Roger Robinson’s As All Boys Did

headers
grey Filas
galt
on slugs
Ren and Stimpy
protests in McDonalds
when they gave me
Barbie
instead of a car
scars upon scars
on corduroy knees
running face first to the wind
to win the playground race
Chinese burns and head locks

until I was asked to  – show ’em my privates
pretence deciphered
not one of them
don’t let them see my
church dresses
and butterfly wings

singing football chants
louder than the next lad
Tekken and Need for Speed
a fist to the screen then
a stern look from my mother

…No more Playstation till you learn
to calm your temper

I was an open-mouthed breather

flipping collectable coins
playing to the binary of biology, this species
bird faeces on the shoulder is a good sign
I’ve been stabbing trees
cutting the doll’s hair off
kickboxing and blue socks
wrestling and mud and mud and throwing rocks
in the park instead of bread

straddling the shed
coming to the edge like Evel Knievel
ready to break bones
hoping I will crack myself open
show them the rotting spice
everything nice and pink
like blood curdled with piss
this is what I am made of

With all this in mind, for the past two years I have been developing an idea for a project called DeCipher, sharing how I merge mathematics with poetry. So far I’ve had the pleasure of working with school groups and young people with the help of Manchester Science Festival and Africa Writes. In the full version of the project I want to merge my artistic practices with Realistic Mathematics Education theory. Basically I want to deliver fun creative maths lessons that feel like poetry workshops or dance classes or baking parties. I want to teach people from a range of ages, backgrounds, genders. Hopefully I can do something to guide us back towards the original meaning of binary – ‘two together’. Things do not have to be one or the other, or should that be one or zero?

Keisha Thompson is a Manchester-based writer, performance artist and producer. Find out more about her work at keishathompson.com or follow her on Twitter.

1. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/gender-gap-math-comparative-advantage/

When did it become curriculum versus creativity, rather than a creative curriculum?  

Apples and Snakes’ patron and  former Children’s Laureate Michael Rosen recently wrote in one of his brilliant blogs:

‘our school system is skewed as never before to testing and exams’

As a parent of two secondary school aged children, I am in the position to sadly agree. Right from entry to primary school at the age of four, our children are being prepared for a variety of tests. Rosen argues that all four-year-olds are essentially ‘GSCE apprentices’ – already preparing for the bigger tests to come, and taught in exam question related chunks of knowledge called attainment targets.

Our schools are data driven, fearful of league tables based on exam results and OFSTED reports and the endless capturing of data about student attainment at every level. As an ex-governor at my children’s primary school, I have seen the impact of the ongoing stress of this on the school’s leadership. It is constantly creating oppositions:

• Competition between schools, rather than collaboration
• The individual student, rather than the group/team/community
• Doing as you are told/accepting the knowledge rather than questioning/inventing/imagining
• Facts instead of exploration
• Being right rather than being wrong

Is this really the way to create ‘educated’ children? And if it is, then what do we mean by educated? As Sir Ken Robinson said in his famous 2006 TED talk entitled Do schools kill creativity? (the most viewed TED talk ever at over 53 million views):

‘if you are not prepared to be wrong, you will not come up with anything original’

He went on to argue that through our government’s desire to constantly seek out better results and improve league tables, we are actually ‘educating people out of their creative capacities’, something we are all born with.  We are not looking at or nurturing the whole child, but just a very small part of their incredible capabilities, the parts that can be tested. How do you test kindness, or compassion or self-esteem? Surely these are values we should be encouraging too, as well as knowing what a fronted adverbial is?

At Apples and Snakes one of our strategic aims is ‘to challenge expectations of what poetry is and can be’. We encourage the artists we work with and our staff to think outside of the box; when things go wrong, we talk about it and how to make it better next time. Our Book a Poet scheme places poets, rappers and storytellers in schools and community settings across the country – again and again the feedback we receive from teachers and bookers is that the children who do not normally participate, or who may struggle with traditional literacy based lessons, flourish and thrive in our workshops.

‘It was fascinating to watch the students engaged and succeeding beyond their usual levels of achievement’ – teacher feedback

‘The students were shown their own potential’ – teacher feedback

‘I really enjoyed this, it made me think about poetry in a completely different way’ – student feedback

Why is this? Partly it’s the fact that all the poets we work with are inspiring role models leading creative lives and they bring a fresh perspective into students’ everyday lives. It’s more than this though, it’s a different way of looking at language, encouraging playfulness with words, moving around the classroom or the space rather than sitting at desks, opportunities to perform often as a group rather than just as an individual. I know some great teachers and I know many will use different strategies to involve their students, but at the end of the day they have to teach the curriculum and get their class through the tests – they are restricted where poets are not. Poets see no limits to words, grammar or punctuation, and no right word for one thing; part of the joy of poetry is the exploration and creativity of finding the sounds and the rhythms that resonate deep down.

On 28 September 2018 over a 1000 headteachers marched on parliament over ongoing budget cuts. I can only hope that they will continue to find the funds to allow artists from all creative disciplines to visit schools regularly and for trips out to arts events, so that students are still able to express themselves creatively, rather than be confined by the increasing demands and straight-jacket of the curriculum.

Photo by Suzi Corker

First Published October 2018