A Whole New Angle

Friday, February 11, 2005

Page 15

AT THE SIDEBAR (Column)

A Whole New Angle

By J’AMY PACHECO

As if my life weren’t complicated enough.

Like most working mothers, I have a lot to handle on a daily basis outside of work—getting the husband to his job and the child to her school (and trying to avoid getting those two mixed up); cooking and cleaning, keeping the weeds at bay outdoors and the laundry at bay inside; grocery shopping, miscellaneous errand running and making sure the front door is locked at night are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

Each time I start to think things might be getting under control, something new pops up. This week, it’s geometry.

There are many challenges I expected to face in my adult life, but math wasn’t one of them. I thought I left that behind the day I last donned a cap and gown and walked across a grassy field to collect my ticket out of Number City. I mean, everybody leaves school knowing that unless they’re continuing on to the Rocket Science Academy, they’ll never need to use algebra or geometry again.

You see, while I was a rather good student, I was extremely untalented when it came to math. I was okay as long as things made sense—in the two-plus-three-equals-five kind of way. But when “X” started taking the place of the two and “Y” subbed for three and I had to figure out the rest, something short-circuited in me and…well, that was the end of my dream of attending the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

So you can imagine my surprise when my third-grader looked up from her math homework a few nights ago to ask a question about line segments. Every moment of mathematical panic I’d ever experienced came rushing back. I staggered over to look at her book and there it was: a section titled, “Geometry.”

There, in hands so tiny they still write letters to Santa Claus, was a book containing terms like “ray,” “right angle” and “line segment.”

I was stunned. And stumped, because I had no idea what a line segment was. But there sat my little girl, the child who looks to me for guidance, inspiration and homework help, gazing at me with hope in her big hazel eyes. Hope that I would be able to explain to her how many line segments were contained in the house-shaped sketch in her math book.

Instinct took over and I started to do the first thing I thought of—set off the smoke alarm and evacuate the house, leaving the math book behind. Unfortunately, I couldn’t reach the button on the alarm, so I had to settle for calling another child’s mother.

For half an hour, we discussed geometry. While our daughters kicked back in front of their respective television sets, my friend and I discussed right angles, line segments, and the astonishing turn of events that brought geometry back into our well-seasoned lives.

Eventually, we devised what we thought—hoped—was an accurate lesson in line segments, rays and angles and hung up to help our daughters with their homework. If our daughters got it wrong, at least they’d be wrong together.

As I lay in bed that night, glad to have the experience behind me, I was struck by the thought that the night’s lesson had been just the first in that chapter of the book. There had to be more geometry coming.

God help me, because nobody else can. Not even Mr. Lunden, the eighth grade math teacher who gave me the only “D” I received in my entire educational career.

(Come to think of it, it could have been algebra in which Mr. Lunden gave me that abysmal grade. I’m not sure if it was algebra or geometry, because I found them so confusing I’m not even sure which one I took. Even if it was algebra I’m in trouble, because that has to be coming down the mathematical pike.)

What the heck happened to third grade?

Up until now, my daughter’s homework consisted of memorizing the multiplication tables up to the nines. I didn’t know them, either, but I have a calculator and I’m not afraid to use it. Suddenly, things are getting far too complicated for me.

I think there may be a conspiracy here. I left school thinking I’d never need geometry and algebra again, and here I am having to use it. But I’m only using it to teach the next generation.

Will she ever need it? I’m guessing only if she has children of her own, and is called upon to help with their homework.

Unless…I wonder if the Rocket Science Academy has any openings?