Maths Stereotypes

One of my college mates is now settled in the US. One time, he wrote about his 9 yo daughter who had written a poem telling how her parents had let her down. I loved my friend’s comment as he described that on Facebook, “Instead of writing poems, why can’t she be like a normal Indian girl in America who’s solving calculus problems at this age?”

 

Stereotypes. Usually, they’re bad, but when it comes to Asians in America, the stereotype (and source for jokes) is that their kids are very smart. 


 

That stereotype is not without basis. After all, (1) Asian education system teaches a lot of things much earlier than the American system, and (2) Asian parents are very, er, hands-on in their children’s education.

 

While reading Marcus du Sautoy’s Music of the Primes, I saw another side of point #1 above about the Asian education system. Neal Koblitz is an American mathematician. When he was 6 yo old, his family spent a year in Baroda. He recollects:

“The math standards there (in India) were higher than in American schools. The next year, when I returned to the US, I was so far ahead of my classmates that my teacher erroneously believed that I had a special gift for mathematics.”

And adds:

“Like other mistaken notions that teachers get into their heads, this sort of erroneous belief has a way of becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. As a result of all the encouragement after my return from India, I was on my way toward becoming a mathematician.”

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