Comments on: Encounters

By: Show and Tell - Asymptotia

Show and Tell - Asymptotia — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 07:02:25 +0000

[...] Of course, this is a very good thing overall (see earlier discussions here, here, and here -including the illuminating sometimes depressing discussion threads- (and more recently here, here and here, for example) about increasing the number of times that young people are made aware of a career choice that they can make that society, through the media, etc, tells them that they can’t make), and I’m very willing to help where I can. [...]

By: Cosmic Variance Goes To Church | Cosmic Variance

Cosmic Variance Goes To Church | Cosmic Variance — Wed, 26 Apr 2006 03:58:42 +0000

[...] He seemed stunned that I was not only receptive to his opening gambit, I was fluent in it myself! I reached over and shook his hand and said “I write about this issue all the time! How can I help?!” (You, dear reader, know that I write about this, of course. See for example my posts entitled “Black Scientists“, “Encounters“, and “The Black Middle Classes“.) [...]

By: Black Scientists | Cosmic Variance

Black Scientists | Cosmic Variance — Sun, 19 Feb 2006 04:49:24 +0000

[...] Of course, this is a very good thing overall (see an earlier discussion here , here and here -including the illuminating sometimes depressing discussion threads- about increasing the number of times that young people are made aware of a career choice that they can make that society tells them that they can’t make), and I’m very willing to help where I can. [...]

By: Clifford

Clifford — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 05:17:04 +0000

Thanks Citrine! -cvj

By: citrine

citrine — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 17:06:09 +0000

Oops. wrong url.
Here’s the right one.

https://logon.merrickbank.com/

By: citrine

citrine — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 16:49:28 +0000

Soon after reading Clifford’s post, I checked one of my credit card accounts online.

http://www.merrickbank.com/

When I saw the first pic after the Merrick Bank header, I couldn’t help smiling yet again, thinking of Clifford’s encounter.

By: robert

robert — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 13:07:11 +0000

Tales like yours always lift the spirits. I’ve a couple, more or less in the same vein. The first is of a colleague who was reviewing a laptop animation of hydrodynamics results on a trans-Atlantic flight. In the next seat was a young boy who, after some minutes, chipped in with ‘Here mister, your game’s not that good is it, do you want to try one of mine’. And the other, of a wild child who dropped out from conventional education for a year or two, then decided to get back on track. I helped her out with a bit of math and science tuition. I remember her Eureka moment, when she realised that maths really did make contact with the real world. Four year’s on she contacted me, with a first class honours degree in econometrics and a ‘proper’ job in the bag. A happy ending? After one year she packed it all in to devote herself to the joys of surfing.

By: JoAnne

JoAnne — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 05:33:19 +0000

Indeed, these small things can make a huge difference to a child. I distinctly remember when my father’s cousin taught me (at an early age) the powers of 2: 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, etc. I grasped it immediately and was thrilled beyond belief. I made a point of rattling it off to my friends (geesh, I must have looked like a total geek!). She was the only relative who bothered to teach such facts, and perhaps it stands out that she was a *she*.

By: Clifford

Clifford — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 05:01:59 +0000

Hmmm, interesting idea there. Bit heavy to tote around though…..
-cvj

By: Sean

Sean — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 04:53:07 +0000

Very nice story. Kids are naturally interested, we just have to feed the interest rather than scaring them off or boring them to tears. I remember my first intro to Pythagoras’s theorem — an eye-opener.

But Clifford, don’t you carry around signed copies of D-Branes to hand out on just such occasions?

By: Arun

Arun — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 23:14:17 +0000

The world may not be magic and there may not be any ineffable mysteries; nevertheless we cannot know what we might wish to know, such as what is going on in a little girl’s head, and what might come of a chance meeting in a bus.

By: Quibbler

Quibbler — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 16:47:08 +0000

that’s a great story.

there were a few people in my childhood and adolescence who caused me to realise that science/math could be both interesting as well as aesthetically elegant; and generally these realisations took the form of seemingly “little” occurences such as your bus ride, but they certainly made a difference to me.

the approach makes a huge difference. very often the approach is “that’s obvious”, as Lee said. but girls and underrepresented ethnic groups often don’t even get that attitude. instead, they’re being interested in math/science is treated as “cute” but in a patronising way, rather than an endearing way.

thansk for posting this, Clifford. made my day.

–Q

By: ed hessler

ed hessler — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 16:14:03 +0000

Ah, such moments; sometimes they are the very essence of life distilled down. These experiences are a gift in receiving and in hearing. I loved imagining the two of you doing your maths, each no doubt encouraging the other as well as knowing that the other was a learner, too.

There was a wonderful Australian/New Zealand (?)teacher, Sylvia Ashton-Warner, who started each day with a word bigger than many of us would think kids interested in, alas, capable of, but she had learned that kids like such “power” words, learning what they mean and feeling them roll off their tongues. I’m reminded of Henry McPhail’s wonderful book for very young “to be read to’s,” titled “Henry Bear’s Park.” Henry’s Dad was no mere balloonist; he was an “ascensionist.”

By: Lee

Lee — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 15:57:58 +0000

I think it’s especially important that you took her efforts so seriously. Too often, I see adults treat young children condescendingly when it comes to their academic pursuits. Of course, the numbers she was writing were elementary multiplication problems that most any adult, much less a professor of physics at USC, would know. Yet, too many times, the response to the child, either verbally or by manner, would have been, “Oh, that’s so obvious” when to the child, it is a big deal that she’s learned that much. And, I don’t believe that people are encouraged to learn more about anything when their efforts are so disparaged.

Instead, you responded by attempting to encourage her inquisitiveness by providing her with something that was reasonably designed to pique her interest. She may or may not follow up on that diagram, but I have a feeling she probably appreciated the way you treated her. And, maybe she left with the impression that academic pursuits of any type are not as geeky as she might have thought before she boarded that bus.

By: Urbano

Urbano — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 15:53:10 +0000

Very nice! I really liked it!!! Congratulations for this piece of writing!

By: Plato

Plato — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 12:35:29 +0000

A Perspective on Powers of Ten?:)

By: Claire

Claire — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 07:39:24 +0000

what a lovely story!

By: the one Intelligently designed

the one Intelligently designed — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 07:33:41 +0000

Realy lovely and cute story

By: Phil Plait

Phil Plait — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 05:44:50 +0000

It’s times like that which add sparkle to our lives, isn’t it? They are also good moments to hold onto when someone else comes along and says something to bring you down. She may not explicitly remember that encounter, but maybe she’ll remember that someone else was doing fancy math, and that maybe it’s okay to study it.

By: chan

chan — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 04:48:22 +0000

Truely lovely story! I really enjoyed it.

Hopefully she could continue to love math (and all the beutiful things around her).