RE: NANFA-- Natives in the calss room

Jay DeLong (thirdwind_at_att.net)
Sun, 17 Sep 2000 21:34:35 -0700

Some people may think that learning math is as unnecessary as learning
another language. That's so untrue. Math and statistics are:
1- ways to communicate ideas and observations.
2- ways to design experiments to test ideas, and prove or disprove claims.
3- ways to develop critical thinking skills to make better sense of the
world and filter out the everyday BS we have to deal with. There is so much
crap being fed us by television and other media. A basic understanding of
statistics will make you a smarter consumer and voter.

And like you said, Richard, one doesn't have to learn math or any other
subject to the exclusion of other subjects! And like Rob C said, just do
it-- be passionate about something and then you'll have an easier time
learning the necessary math and statistics!

--
Jay DeLong
Olympia, WA


> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-nanfa_at_aquaria.net On Behalf
> Of DasArm_at_aol.com
> Sent: Sunday, September 17, 2000 9:12 PM
> To: nanfa_at_aquaria.net
> Subject: Re: NANFA-- Natives in the calss room
>
>
> I just wanted to clarify that the reason I said that is that the study of
> native fishes, in comparison to mathematics would probably be more
> interesting to kids in school because it just seems like it would
> be the more
> "charismatic" course out of the two. All of the wierd and
> interesting facts
> there are to be learned about native fishes seem like they would "out do"
> math when competing for kids' interest.I know many people that
> think of math
> as being somewhat dry and dull in comparison to history or
> science. But it is
> still necessessary to learn math, and it helps to learn math if you can
> cultivate an interest in it.




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