I Peaked in Third Grade
I had a chance to be good at math. In 3rd grade me and one other girl in my class were pulled aside my our teacher and informed that we had the two highest math testing scores of the class. This, she told us, meant we would occasionally be receiving different work and advanced instruction. That never happened. After this year, my math skills dropped and I had many math experiences to turn me away from the subject forever. In 5th grade, math was split into two classes, the normal class, and the advanced class. Since my 3rd grade score was high I was put in the advanced class where I proceeded to greatly struggle in keeping up. I was then moved to the average class where I succeeded without trying. This made the …show more content…
Whatever skills I had in 3rd grade seem to have left me and whatever positive feelings I had for the subject were soon to be obliterated by middle school math teachers. The first math teacher I had in middle school is to this day the only person to ever give me detention. I was the type of student to be very scared of getting in trouble. Besides talking a bit too much, I made sure to follow all the rules. The first math teacher I had in middle school however, had so many rules that upon reflecting back on, seem even more ridiculous now than they did then. He used to make students stay 5 minutes after class if they looked him in the eye during silent work time. “If you're looking at me you're not looking at your work” He would say. What heinous crime was I punished for you ask? Not pushing in my chair as I went to go turn in my assignment. Upon hearing the words “You didn't push in your chair, that's detention.”Any taste I had for math went straight out of my life never to return. 7th grade wasn't a great improvement, as my teacher most often referred to me as “Natalie” a friend of mine who shared my blonde hair. This however pales in comparison to the worst math experience (and worst school experience) of my life thus far that came in the shape of 11th grade Pre-Calculus. By this point, I had known for years that I didn't like math, but until this class I had never feared it. As I had been diagnosed with a
I had a chance to be good at math. In 3rd grade me and one other girl in my class were pulled aside my our teacher and informed that we had the two highest math testing scores of the class. This, she told us, meant we would occasionally be receiving different work and advanced instruction. That never happened. After this year, my math skills dropped and I had many math experiences to turn me away from the subject forever. In 5th grade, math was split into two classes, the normal class, and the advanced class. Since my 3rd grade score was high I was put in the advanced class where I proceeded to greatly struggle in keeping up. I was then moved to the average class where I succeeded without trying. This made the …show more content…
Whatever skills I had in 3rd grade seem to have left me and whatever positive feelings I had for the subject were soon to be obliterated by middle school math teachers. The first math teacher I had in middle school is to this day the only person to ever give me detention. I was the type of student to be very scared of getting in trouble. Besides talking a bit too much, I made sure to follow all the rules. The first math teacher I had in middle school however, had so many rules that upon reflecting back on, seem even more ridiculous now than they did then. He used to make students stay 5 minutes after class if they looked him in the eye during silent work time. “If you're looking at me you're not looking at your work” He would say. What heinous crime was I punished for you ask? Not pushing in my chair as I went to go turn in my assignment. Upon hearing the words “You didn't push in your chair, that's detention.”Any taste I had for math went straight out of my life never to return. 7th grade wasn't a great improvement, as my teacher most often referred to me as “Natalie” a friend of mine who shared my blonde hair. This however pales in comparison to the worst math experience (and worst school experience) of my life thus far that came in the shape of 11th grade Pre-Calculus. By this point, I had known for years that I didn't like math, but until this class I had never feared it. As I had been diagnosed with a