Tag Archives: math anxiety

Thai Math

Common sense has returned to Thailand, when the present government admitted before the Year of the Dragon ushered in that the recreational use of cannabis or marijuana is wrong, which was decriminalized in the kingdom in 2022.

Mr. Chonlanan Srikaew, Thai health minister, said that the government will soon be moving a new bill that will allow the drug to be used only for health and medicinal purposes.

Indeed, a big blow to hundreds of marijuana dispensary owners, and to millions of tourists who’re planning to visit the “Land of a Thousand Smiles” to get a kick out of marijuana.

And to a small extent, the ban will also affect recreational math educators who’ve started working on new and fertile questions that incorporate the legalized use of marijuana recreationally.

Should “Thailand math” questions be allowed in recreational math classrooms?

Marijuana Math

In an earlier post on “Marijuana Math” under “Math Word of the Day,” on LinkedIn, I poked fun that in tourism the “fine” city of Singapore would likely be losing out against Thailand. I mentioned tongue-in-cheek a few positives of Thailand being a “marijuana mecca” for adventurous or uninhibited tourists, especially those who come from conservative countries that criminalize the use of the drug recreationally.

With the new cannabis law in the pipeline, the number of tourists bypassing budget-unfriendly, family-friendly Singapore for wallet-friendly, pro-same-sex unions Thailand should be expected to be far lower than initially feared.

Math on a High

Let’s indulge in some recreational Thai Math questions, while there is some time to be on a high. The window of opportunity to enjoy these soon-to-be-banned word problems is closing in fast, unless the power-hungry military stages another coup to put in place a new pro-cannabis government.

1. A MAGA patriot, who recently visited Thailand, was caught with 24 cannabis candies and chewing gums in his locker at Mar-a-Lago. The fine is $80 for each candy, and $90 for each chewing gum. If the judge sentenced the culprit for a total of $2,010, how many candles and how many chewing gums were seized?

2. Which has the higher chance of occurring in the next quarter century: Singapore qualifying for the World Cup, or Singapore allowing tourists (but not locals and permanent residents) to use marijuana recreationally?

3. If the medicinal use of marijuana debatably proved to be a quasi-effective cure in treating math anxiety, mathophobia, or other mathematical disorders in a-not-too-distant future, would the “fine” city condone its use among its oft-self-professed semi-innumerate citizens?

Like the days of the legalization of recreational cannabis in Thailand, the days of the recreational use of Thai Math questions, too, look numbered.

Recreationally or restrictively yours

References

Thai government plans to ban recreational cannabis use http://tinyurl.com/mt6fhs2m

Number of young children who accidentally ate cannabis edibles jumped 1,375% in five years, study finds http://tinyurl.com/2mwb55d9

© Yan Kow Cheong, February 11, 2024.

Singapore’s PSLE Math Paper

There is an educational (or psychological or emotional) price a country has to pay if it wants its students to continually rank among the top three in international comparative studies like TIMSS and PISA, or in regional or international math contests and competitions.

An irreverent definition of Singapore’s most dreaded school exam paper

Understandably, parents in Singapore are unhappy about the difficult PSLE (grade 6) math questions that are used to assess their children, before they’d graduate from primary (grades 1–6) school to secondary (middle) school.

And the oft-politically correct or modeled answers from the city-state’s Ministry of Education (MOE) hardly ever pacify or satisfy teachers, parents, and caregivers; in most cases, the canned suggestions or quasi-laughable solutions only make them angrier or more cynical.

PC Slogans for Kiasu Parents

Be it the mantra that “every (local) school is a good school,” or that parents need to help or educate their children believe that “their self-worth or value isn’t dependent on their exam grades” is easier preached than practiced.

When politicians or MOE officials preach to parents that they needn’t be paranoid about their children’s PSLE exam or math score, because it’s not the end of the world, it’s like ex-loansharks-turned-philanthropists or ethically challenged ex-CEOs- or ex-bankers-turned-preachers now telling the financially struggling public that money isn’t everything, or that they’d not make money their god. For the haves to tell the have-nots, it’s utter hypocrisy, to say the least.

Answers and oft-ill-edited half-baked solutions are usually from tutors or teachers-moonlighters.

Tuition: A Necessary Evil for the Nation

Without compulsory tuition or heavy parental involvement, the majority of elementary math students in local schools would likely struggle to score a decent grade in their PSLE math paper.

Singapore’s PSLE math paper with its quota of brain-unfriendly questions looks like a necessary evil that would help define or maintain the “fine” city’s high standard of mathematics regionally and internationally.

From Mid-Year to Mock Exams

This year, Primary 6 students didn’t have to sit for mid-year exams at school, because last year, Education Minister Chan Chun Sing had said that the move would allow them to “focus more on their learning and less on marks.”

In the aftermath of the MOE’s move to do away with all mid-year exams for primary and secondary schools, tuition centers saw a golden opportunity to lure kiasu parents with their mock mid-year exams, whose questions are generally harder (not better) than those set in the PSLE math paper.

Other than parental or peer pressure to excel, most students’ undue stress could be traced to the difficulty of math questions set by neighborhood schools (driven by school rankings) and tuition centers (powered by profits), which are generally harder than those that appear in the PSLE math paper. Yes, they’re the two big culprits that set an unhealthy number of nonroutine questions that often demoralize the kids, by making them feel like they still “aren’t that good in math.”

A Promised Land for Geeks—and Tax Fugitives

Singapore is a “promised land” for those who’re born or blessed with the “mathematical gene” or for those who’d afford a private tutor. However, for the majority of average or math-anxious school children, we can only pray that PSLE math wouldn’t become their bête noire, and that God would keep them motivated and focused as they go through this oft-stressful rite of passage of their schooling years.

I might sound like a mathocrite (short for “mathematical hypocrite”) in giving mathematical or parental advice; nevertheless, let me end with this educational slogan that is worth reiterating, because I believe that the sooner we put it into practice, the less stressful (or peaceful) our life will be: Our math scores or grades don’t define us—in or out of school, and certainly not in life.

Grade-consciouslessly yours

© Yan Kow Cheong, June 18, 2023.