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PEOPLE TEND TO classify themselves into two groups: those who are mathematical and those who are not. We think of mathematical ability as a character trait like eye colour, you are born with or without it.
From an early age, people label themselves (or are labelled by others) as being good or bad at maths, more so than any other subject. By the time students reach the Leaving Cert, that mindset appears deeply embedded. In 2012, only 22 per cent of students took Higher Level Maths, compared to 37 per cent in Irish and 65 per cent in English.
The decision to award extra CAO points to students taking Higher Level Maths in the Leaving Certificate has helped to increase the number of students taking the Higher Level paper (from 16 per cent in 2011 to 22 per cent in 2012). But for many, this intervention is too little too late. The decision to take the Higher Level Paper is made between 16 and 18 years of age, but many have implicitly made this decision much earlier, when they fall behind in class.
Furthermore, the bonus points intervention has had no impact on reducing the number of people taking Foundation Level Maths – on average 11 per cent of students in the last three years. Do we believe that after 14 years of compulsory maths education, only 22 per cent of students can master differential equations and advanced calculus in the Higher Level Paper, while 11 per cent of students can only deal with the basic maths in the Foundation Level paper? Do we believe that 11 per cent of students are fundamentally not mathematical?
John Mighton, a Canadian mathematician, disagrees and passionately believes that any child can be taught to excel at maths. Although differences of ability will always exist between people, there is no need for the wide variation in performance that we see today. He believes that to effectively teach maths, it must be broken into a series of very small steps, which in combination leads to the full mastery of the topic.
“No step is too small to ignore,” Mighton says. “Math is like a ladder. If you miss a step, sometimes you can’t go on. And then you start losing your confidence and then the hierarchies develop”. All too often, children miss a step in this ladder and soon, the class has moved on and the gap in performance between children grows.
Mighton started JUMP (Junior Undiscovered Mathematical Prodigies) in Canada in 2002 to address this issue. The programme is based on a methodology that breaks questions and challenges down into very small steps – manageable, systematic strides towards success. Mighton terms this “guided discovery”. It has been running in Canada for nearly 10 years and is now being taught to roughly 86,000 students annually. Research supports the methodology, with randomised controlled studies concluding that JUMP is more successful than the incumbent Canadian programme at improving the mathematical abilities of students.
Most significantly, JUMP helps to raise outcomes for all students while simultaneously narrowing the achievement gap – the process is designed to ensure that all students advance together. In one school in Toronto, in her first year of using JUMP, a teacher lifted her class’s average ranking from the 66th to 92nd percentile, based on standardised testing. In her second year using JUMP, she moved her next class from the 55th to 98th percentiles. As Mighton says: “They start developing a love of the subject and the interesting thing is they don’t compete so much anymore against each other. They start competing against the problem collectively.”
Teachers also praise the JUMP programme, as many feel the sequential approach allows them to build up their own confidence and knowledge of the subject. As one teacher in Vancouver noted: “My experiences with JUMP has been transformative, for my students and for myself. I struggled greatly as a student from a very early age and since I began supplementing with JUMP it has given me the motivation, skills, knowledge and confidence to pursue math.”
In Ireland, much of the focus around maths has been our poor international performance. Between 2000 and 2009, Ireland dropped from 16th to 32nd in international rankings. Although our outcomes stayed relatively constant during this time period, other countries are racing ahead. While it must be a national priority to improve our maths outcomes, we must focus on addressing the roots of the problem, as well as using stopgap measures such as bonus points.
Mighton came to Ireland in March 2012 as part of Change Nation and performed a demonstration of the JUMP method to a class of students, keeping both adults and students enthralled. A shy, soft-spoken man, he relied neither on trickery nor sleight of hand in his demonstration; he relied on the JUMP methodology he has created over a decade, which is based on evidence and research, a methodology that he knows is effective.
As a result of his visit in March, a consortium of organisations came together to explore the possibility of launching a pilot programme in Ireland, which is now planned for roll-out in 2013. At a time when negativity abounds in our newspapers and airwaves, it is uplifting to see a group of private, public and social sector stakeholders voluntarily coming together to work on innovative solutions to our nation’s most pressing problems.
If you would like to find out more about the JUMP maths programme, please see details at Change Nation or contact: pamela.fitzgerald@gmail.com.
Change Nation is an initiative of Ashoka.
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I have four kids who live and one little girl who didn’t make it. It was the worst experience in my life and would break a relationship. I took a white coffin out the back door of holles street and as much as they were sympathetic it felt like nothing. We travelled with my little girl to glasnevin and I handed her into an open grave, it sticks to me this day. I have never really gotten over the trauma nor has my wife. We are lucky we have three healthy kids and my heart goes out to everyone that loses a child. Support Feaileacain
@orb7eckn: My deepest sympathies .. sorry have no other better words ..
@orb7eckn: Heat broken for your loss
@orb7eckn: Thank you for sharing your story a wonderful Lady and forever in my heart.
@orb7eckn: omg this is heartbreaking
@orb7eckn: So very sorry for your loss Joe. Condolences to yourself & your wife.
@orb7eckn: So sorry Joe. Heartfelt condolences to you and your family. My wife ( before I met her ) suffered the loss of her 10 day old Baby. She had a husband whom she was in the middle of divorcing. She told me she had a social worker and a language interpreter by her side who offered whatever comfort they could. The hospital staff and medics just wanted them out. I hope your family are doing well.
Savita Halappanavar …..
In all walks of life there good and bad. The problem now days is there to much box ticking and appearances the new nurses have no empathy or emotion or told not to then you have the others the only reason they choose health care was to get a visa so they have no interest at all added with overworked is what we see now.
@Be Lucky: As a patient in st James and st Vincent’s . Care was so bad,, couldn’t call it care , I felt like a criminal who didn’t deserve kindness .. nurses , it was rare to find one nice nurse .. if you cried or anyone saw you crying you got worse care .
I well.believe these horrible le stories I had the worst nightmare myself 23 years ago in the Rotunda hospital
@Karen Marten: I was so scared having my second child but it was the easiest birth out of 3 . 3hours from checking in to delivery was home 12 hours later .
3rd child in drogheda dirtiest hospital I’ve ever been in .
@Karen Marten: Same, but only 5 years ago.
I don’t think this is limited to birth, but is more widespread.
Maybe the problem is with how medical staff are selected.
There is a certain segment of the population that is psychopathic, or of similar psychological makeup.
People who lack empathy.
Yet the presence or absence of empathy is not a factor in who gets to become a medical professional.
Shouldn’t it be?
“… people giving birth …”?
@Athena: Yep!
We’re not discussing pigeons here.
@Jimmy Wallace: Yes, as it is part of the root cause of the problem.
@Athena: You mean the root cause of the problem is people in the medical profession who seem to lack empathy?
Is there anyone commenting here that shows that same lack of empathy, do you think?
@Jimmy Wallace: Of course it is a dreadful story but calling out the Journal when they publish woke nonsense is important too. People don’t have babies, women do. To ignore this nonsense is to allow it to become normalised.
Any wonder birth rates are falling with no proper health or housing
It was better in the times of “call the midwives ” my mother had some stories of the midwives calling when the younger kids came home from school they were told look what the mid wife brought a new brother /sister .
Even with paying private you aren’t guaranteed to have a private room. It’s bonkers. You spend 5 to 7000 and you aren’t even sure not to end up in an overcrowded public hospital room.
Doctors aren’t qualified, nurses have 0 empathy. If you can avoid giving birth here. Do.
@Alex: A lot of them were not qualified. My older brother was delivered by a trainee doctor in July 1973. Due to a lack of oxygen he suffered brain damage. He is 52 next month has the mental age of a 8 year old. God help him, he never stood a chance with the backwards system we had then.
@David Corrigan: that’s awful your poor mother and brother
@Karen Marten: It’s not simple Karen. My mother took great care of him until she passed away. Her attitude was that it was her problem. They were chased by the solicitors in the 70′s but they would have nothing to do with that. It’s not going to fix him is what they would say.
I reckon he would have been a solitcitor or something. A big strong man denied everything by a system not fit for the stone ages.
@David Corrigan: iys just awful the way women were and still are being treated so badly during childbirth . And then theres no support or services for children or parent .
@Karen Marten: We had A LOT of problems getting my brother care after my mother passed away. Escalated it to the highest ranks politically and in the HSE. Might as well be talking to a stone bloody wall. One HSE executive got angry at me because I emailed her. I told her to go and get a fecking real job and cut out her nonsense.
As far as I am concerned, the state put my brother into the condition he is in so they state will definitely provide a little support or whatever he needs.
Like you said, there’s no support for a lot of people. First world taxes for third world services.
I can’t actually fathom this is still ongoing. We had very good care.. apart from one nurse in her early 20s who decided that our 12 hour old little one should be woken up by rubbing an wet towel soaked in ice water on her back to shock her awake… If I had been less sleep deprived I’d probably have rammed the towel somewhere else.. but to see the horrors written above is painful to read.. it should be a wonderful memory not scarred by the traumas as described..
What a horrific read. Those poor women. I’ve only recently had experience of medical professionals not believing a patient crippled with neuralgia pain. Every single one of those women should be taking a Medical negligence claim against the HSE or a Human Rights action against the state for abuse.
I have to wonder how much of this horror is down to being understaffed and overloaded.
There should be enough staff of all levels in every hospital that they work the same kind of hours as everyone else.
There should also be enough facilities that nobody is on trolleys.
Exhausted overworked staff pretty much guarantees poor care and bad mistakes.
How do we get there from here?
We can’t start somewhere else.
@Steve O’Hara-Smith: I remember midwives chatting and laughing away at the workstation for most of the night 1 night after I’d had a section it wasn’t busy. I had to ring the bell for painkillers that were due as they weren’t giving them to me routinely and she was irritated when she came in, gave me the drugs and I asked when the next one was due. She told me the next one was due at 5 am and if I wanted it, to come out to the nurse’s station to get it I was still struggling with walking. They were definitely not rushed off their feet. This was holles street and it was rife with this culture so much treatment like this it was disgraceful. I was private too not that it should make a difference.
Stories like this make me even happier with my decision to not have children.
Absolutely despicable women are bring treated like this when they are at their most vulnerable point in their lives.
They deserve better!
Oh but we’re a ” rich advanced country ” so we should be happy
Private is the only way, no one wants to be around medical card riff raff
@John D Doe: typical snobbish remark. Who ever reared you must be so proud
@Joe Kelly: class is very important in life
@John D Doe: Even with private you are not guaranteed a private room. It’s one of their policy.
@John D Doe:
Yes, class is important, it’s a pity you have none.
@John D Doe: you could ne treated just as badly in Holles Street or any other private maternity hospital as you could be in a public one actually
@Regular John: as a members of the elite I find your comment amusing
@John D Doe: You claiming to be “elite” whilst unable to write a single sentence without multiple mistakes is amusing. You’re fooling nobody.
This sounds quite barbaric and I’m sure everyone can sympathise for all these women and their families however can I ask if an organisation like the Journal, which prides itself on factchecking, has checked the facts of all these experiences or to play Devils Advocate, if there may possibly be reasons for some of them.
I know when I was a small child and spent a considerable amount of time in hospital I found out it was a training hospital, I honestly thought every injection, every poke and prod was someone practicing on me. I hated them.
The facts are Ireland is one of the safest countries in which to give birth, clearly not one of the most pleasant, as your own statistics show a small, but significant, amount of women have a negative experience.
I suspect questioning this is any aspect will invite certain wrath but is it possible that in the hectic environment of a labour ward certain births become more difficult or confused than others and during these births ideal communication is not always possible. During these births the midwives and doctors present may be focused on delivering a healthy baby and ensuring the new mother is kept well too. This sounds quite barbaric and I’m sure everyone can sympathise for all these women and their families however can I ask if an organisation like the Journal, which prides itself on factchecking, has checked the facts of all these experiences or to play Devils Advocate, if there may possibly be reasons for some of them.
I know when I was a small child and spent a considerable amount of time in hospital I found out it was a training hospital, I honestly thought every injection, every poke and prod was someone practicing on me. I hated them.
The facts are Ireland is one of the safest countries in which to give birth, clearly not one of the most pleasant, as your own statistics show a small, but significant, amount of women have a negative experience.
I suspect questioning this is any aspect will invite certain wrath but is it possible that in the hectic environment of a labour ward certain births become more difficult or confused than others and during these births ideal communication is not always possible. During these births the midwives and doctors present may be focused on delivering a healthy baby and ensuring the new mother is kept well too.
@Boyne Shark: my story is one of them above and everything written was my own words. Yes midwives and doctors are there to ensure the safety and birth of a baby but mistakes happen and they did. But not being honest to a mother is not good enough. Yes giving birth is an unknown esp as a first timer but honesty is easier to deal with hiding information.
@Boyne Shark: I wouldn’t rule out a certain degree of exaggeration in some cases, in the hope of generous compensation. Let’s face it ,it happens.
@Caroline Walsh: I don’t doubt that you recounted your experience accurately and honestly and can only sympathise with you for what you went through. What I asked is if the Journal performed due diligence and checked if there may have been a genuine medical reason or mitigating circumstances that could explain your experience. If they haven’t carried out due diligence then, unfortunately, we will never know.
Terrible reading all this unnecessary suffering of women I could write a book on my very traumatic births which depend on sympathetic and caring doctors and nurse who listen to women .The culture in some hospitals mitigate against this happening and no-one is ever brought to account for mistreating patients .And nothing excuses these inhumane careless so called professionals
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