Math Wonder
- Posted by: coreybinns
- on May 28, 2007 at 6:35 pm
When a classmate in her freshman math class at UCLA tapped Danica McKellar on the shoulder and asked, “Aren’t you the girl who …” she expected him to quiz her about her role as Winnie Cooper on the iconic television show The Wonder Years. Instead he continued, “… got the best score on the exam?” For the first time, McKellar felt recognized as something other than a child actress.
Even though the show’s producers needed to hire an advanced calculus tutor to keep up with the child star’s aptitude, she had never considered becoming a mathematician. Social conditioning, says 32-year-old McKellar, made her believe girls didn’t have a place in the math world. “Who did I think math was for, if it wasn’t for me?”
McKellar headed to college intending to study writing and directing, but ended up putting her numerical skills to use instead, earning a math degree summa cum laude and co-authoring a research paper that solved a statistical mechanics problem involving magnetism in two dimensions—a solution now known as the Chayes-McKellar-Winn theorem.
| Quote: |
| Who did I think math was for, if it wasn’t for me? |
From her math classes, McKellar learned that solving probabilities wasn’t going to solve the biggest math problem in the United States: “Girls fear math,” she says. Although girls and boys in fourth and eighth grades have similar math and science proficiency scores, a national survey recently found that girls are less likely than boys to agree with the statements “I like mathematics” and “I like science.” Teachers often unknowingly foster this preference, which, McKellar claims, isn’t helped by the feeling among young girls that they need to act ditzy in order to get boys to like them. The negative attitudes girls hold for math translate into career choices later on in life: Four times as many men as women hold full-time university faculty positions in mathematics, science, and engineering. And as McKellar sat in a sea of male classmates in her advanced classes she realized she was living the direct repercussions of these early gender inequalities.
McKellar plans to change these statistics by putting some of her other skills to work. “Math doesn’t have good PR. I’m going to do my best to do great PR for math,” she says. As a spokesman for the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, she testified to a Congressional subcommittee in 2000 about the country’s need to better prepare math teachers and draw more young girls toward math, especially at the age when they tend to start avoiding the subject. “Not only is middle school a time in life when girls are dealing with so much emotionally, it’s also when math gets harder.”
To help girls struggling with the complexity that comes with seventh-grade math, McKellar has penned Math Doesn’t Suck: How to Survive Middle School Math Without Losing Your Mind or Breaking a Nail, which hits shelves this August. The book hones in on middle school’s trickiest points-––like fractions, ratios, and percentages—and presents them in a style that’s appropriate for the cool kids’ lunch table. Figure out your “type” in boys and you’ll understand greatest common factors. All of those iced lattes celebrities drink make multiplying fractions tasty. Plus, savvy shopping requires killer decimal skills.
As McKellar fields math questions from kids on her personal website she sees how the hard work and persistence required by math can empower girls. The subject has a reputation for being tough, but coming up with the right numbers can give girls an important boost of courage.
DISCUSSION: 10 Comments
Pretty AND astoundingly good at math? It’s like she’s a Heinlein character brought to life.
I truly applaud Danica McKellar in her efforts to reach the female population. As a fellow female mathematician, I know first hand how male-dominated the sciences truly are. As a math tutor, I am anxious to pick up this book. I do hope it will be another fabulous tool to relate mathematics to new generations and attempt to finally eradicate stereotypes that “Girls don’t do math”. Bravo Ms. McKellar!
Math Humor:
Let a=b.
a^2 = ab
a^2 + a^2 = a^2 + ab
2a^2 = a^2 + ab
2a^2 – 2ab = a^2 + ab – 2ab
2a^2 – 2ab = a^2 – ab
2(a^2 – ab) = 1(a^2 – ab)
2 = 1
and
2 + 1 = 1 + 1
3 = 2 = 1 and so on.
PS: the joke is that it stumps most high schoolers.
Jenny
http://www.spaml.com
Well, as a mathematician myself (one might even say a celebrity mathematician – I was the “mathmo” on Beauty and the Geek in the UK), I’m always glad to see anyone get into maths. However, one thing that’s always interested me is if you look at the split of the sexes at both Undergrad and Postgrad level.
I’m a 3rd year at the moment, and if I look around an average lecture, I tend to see a split of about 75/25 boys to girls. Next, look at PG level – you get very few girls – I know quite a number of Postgrads, only 1 of whom is a girl, so I would suspect a 90/10 split. At Professor/Doctor level, this split seems to be even more acute, looking at the staff for the Department – I can only think of 1 female lecturer or faculty member off the top of my head, and I know most of the department since I’m president of the Maths Society.
Now, obviously it’d be great to see more girls take maths at Uni level (my girlfriend is a great example of this), but I think it’s another challenge all together to get girls to take the study to Doctorate/Professorship level.
Jamie Sawyer
It surprises me a little that the more things change, the more they stay the same. When I was in high school, home computers were just coming out (no such thing as software programs like today). There was a big push to get more girls interested in Computer Science &, of course, math.
In the R.O.P. programming class, we had almost as many girls as boys. Our teacher was a female, so that helped tremendously. The competition during assignments was always girls vs. boys. Happily, we tended to match or outdo them!
I applaud anyone whom attempts to take on something that society has continued to turn a blind eye to. Why do Mothers continue to teach their Daughters, either by choice or example, that college is for ‘finding a husband, or, to take a major that is considered ’safe’?
Kudos to Ms. McKellar!!
It’s great to see a former celebrity who WON’T be appearing on The Surreal Life. . . because she’s living a meaningful, inspiring real life post-stardom. Very impressive, Ms McKellar!
You hit right on target when you alluded to the role of mothers in determining a girl’s interest or lack of it in Mathematics.
Mothers can’t give what they don’t have to their daughters. Most mothers are Math-challenged!
You want girls to get interested? Get the mothers interested!
Perhaps a free program to teach mothers basic Mathematics could help.
Mothers could progress from basic math to middle level and beyond, so that they can acquire enough math skills to help their daughters with homework.
With a better understanding of Mathematics, mothers could turn activities like shopping, banking(going to the bank)and even cooking into math-teachable moments.
this is mine…..i swear to god
i came up with this last year when i was in my english class bored……except tht i used straight like this
1=1
1^2=1*1
1^2-1^2=1*1-1^2
(1+1)(1-1)=1(1-1)
(1+1)=1
2=1
urs is lil dif. way but same
i also found tht this way you can start with any number and end up with equal to the number twice as much……
who r u?
email me at nishu111992@yahoo.com
it doesnt stup most high schooler i showed to lot of my friends and many understood it….i was a sophmore last year…..and now im goin 2 be a junior
and im only 15, but how old are u?
im sorry but it would just annoy any1 if there works been stolen or odly been used by someone else that took time for.
If we allow division by zero any number
number can be made equal to any other
number.
Since a=b => a^2 – ab or a-b is zero.
a=b
a^2 = ab
a^2 – b^2 = ab-b^2
(a+b)(a-b) = b(a-b)
(a+b) = b
a+a = a
2a = a
2 = 1
You cannot divide by a-b which is zero.