Dyslexia Special - Long Division and nights of fear

Have you ever been really scared of anything? Snakes?  Lurkers Lurking under the bed? Swimming?  I've had problems with all of them. I've beaten two out of  three. I'm not sure which I was most frightened of when I was young. These were my three big phobias, which I had from day one of my life. When I was at primary school I developed another fear. Long Division. Whilst not having the same reflex action as snakes or the same grinding terror as lurkers under the bed or the same certainty that I would die as swimming lessons, it had something far worse. It had the opportunity for complete humiliation. You see, I couldn't do it. I just didn't get the concept at all. As a result, any sums that involved long division sent me into a cold sweat. Everyone else seemed to pick it up, but the whole process seemed like some meaningless babble. A couple of times I asked if someone could explain this to me and they magically started talking this strange language, less understandable than a cross between Mandarin Chinese and Swahili. They would write things down and then say "It's easy, just take this, do that, multiply it by the other". It meant nothing.

People talk about the three "R"'s, but I couldn't learn my times tables. That's not strictly true, I leaned the 11 times table up to 11 X 9. At St Vincents in the 1960's we had to recite our times table. When I realised that I could recite the 11 times table up to eleven  nine's I thought this was the chance to actually get a star. When asked, up shot my hand. I did fine, till we got to ten elevens. My mind went blank. The teacher asked "I don't know the hard bit". The teacher responded "The hard bit? How can ten elevens be hard, you just add a zero on the end".  More public derision from my classmates followed. I'm really not sure whether this was a result of dyslexia or stupidity, but it wasn't easy. I developed a new strategy. I'd be naughty when it was maths lesson time. I'd get slung out, maybe I'd get the bat from Sister Gabriel, but at least I wouldn't be publicly humiliated. I got extremely good at winding people up. A useful skill which I regularly use in this blog.

So you may think, what has this foolishly idiotic buffoon got to say about teaching maths to dyslexics. Well a bit more than you think. You see it may surprise you to know I have an O level and an A level in Maths. I actually think I'm gifted in the subject (not that any of my former teachers would do anything apart from laugh at this suggestion). So how do you get from a pathological fear of sums aged 9 in 1971 to 96% in my maths O level mock in 1978 (probably the pinnacle of my career as a mathematician). Well in hindsight, I suspect it was because I had a dyslexic maths teacher for a term.

He spotted the various ruses I'd used (cheating with my homework, etc) and put me on the spot. Stay late after school he said. I had that awful feeling of dread. He then explained that he had spotted what I was doing, because he used to be exactly the same. He said that my biggest problem was that I was scared of maths. He then asked me to recite the eight times table. I couldn't. He asked me to mutiply eight by seven. He watched as I floundered. He then explained his technique for dealing with the problem. It made sense. He then asked me to do a long division. I just stared blankly. He said "I couldn't do this until I was 12. Now I love maths". He explained the technique in plain English - "Actually division doesn't come into it, just multiplication which you've just done and subtraction which you can do with no problem". It all made sense. He then explained that if you can't do the whole lot in your head at once, it doesn't matter, break it all into bite sized chunks and write it down.

In half an hour, I had caught up six years worth of maths. I was horrified. I had suffered six years of humiliation needlessly. It was all down to the fact no one had bothered to take the time to explain it to me. I owe the man a huge debt, but sadly I can't remember his name. Was he dyslexic? I can't be sure, but I'd put money on it. I never really understood what had happened at the time. I'd never heard the word dyslexia. I just suddenly became a bit less thick. I'm still rubbish at many things mathematical, but if I concentrate I can do them as well as anyone (although it takes a bit longer).

I have a radical solution to teaching dyslexics maths. Train other dyslexics to teach them. Whilst most will still remain bad at maths, at least they'll have a teacher who will understand their issues and not make them feel like a worthless piece of S**T. Albert Einstien was dyslexic and he didn't do too bad did he?