Chat thread - come chat, rant, or celebrate, here!

Agree with the traditional games thing Mini, my boys can 'see' at once the number on the side of a dice, or a playing card, but not always if the same number of objects is presented in a different pattern.

x-post Mini

My thoughts.. People take in and relate to info. in many different ways. I don't think having a class of 30 is conducive to a multi-angled approach, even if the teacher is confident in their subject.

If you're a fan of NLP you'll have heard the theory that your language gives away your learning style eg auditory (I hear you, on the same wavelength) visual ( I see), kinaesthetic (getting a feel for).

I'm probably mansplaining aren't I ?

As for the woman on countdown, she's window dressing as ever, one of my cousins is using her maths degree to model climate change....now that's a role model.

Absolutely second what you say about countdown not being maths. So many children struggle with basic arithmetic and it seems that unless they grasp this, because the emphasis at primary is always on mental maths they are considered to be not very good at maths. I once did an hour on topology for primary it was great fun and what is more it was all experimental and concrete, no number work what so ever. I found that there were some children that were really good at spotting patterns using shapes, looking at nature, using foam number tiles and making their own patterns but struggled with memorising the times tables. They couldn't memorise it because they were not audio learners but they could learn by sight, so visual spacial concepts were all there. And if anything visual spacial reasoning is more important. We also had lots of fun just playing games like snakes and ladders, simple card games, dominoes and playing games using money with reception children, some of the children aged 5 had never played any card or board games at home

I suppose my bugbear is that I would be paid more to teach science than to practice it,in my experience the majority of grunt work in labs is done by women. I've worked on production sites and the warehousemen were paid almost twice as much as the quality control analysts. It sends the message that the job has no value.

Why work your socks off to do a science degree if you can't earn a living wage from it?

I think the problem starts in primary school with no expert teaching of science.

I always liked maths, still do and have run maths clubs for primary. So many girls lack confidence, why? who is telling these girls that they can't "do" maths? where does it start?

I have been reading the New Statesman, would never have found it if it were not for the feminist section on MN, thank you. I don't read bloggs, I can't get into it.

marking my place at work

I want to have a look at that too.

Science isn't just undervalued in the UK, I was thinking back to my own science education in secondary school in the States and it was rubbish.

I'm more interested in the basics of the various STEM fields as I feel I never got a good grounding in them at all.

On a more random note, DH pointed out something about the Disney Mary Poppins that I never noticed and now it is really bothering me. He pointed out that Mrs. Banks being involved in the suffragette movement is portrayed as this terribly frivolous unimportant thing that keeps her away from her REAL duties of being a 'proper' mother. Anyone else notice this?

I do think governments try various initiatives to value science (eg current program on Alzheimer's Disease) but somehow the perception down in schools is "boring, hard, geeky" etc.

'Twas ever thus, though. My mum, at an all girls' school, doing Maths/science A levels, was forced to do an afternoon of "arts" each week. Were those doing arts subjects made to do an afternoon of science? That would be a "no".

Right, back to the feminist chat - how was your bubble bath, SGM? I tried one on Tuesday but it wasn't so relaxing with DS1 getting out of bed every five minutes and coming in to check how many bubbles I had left.

I'll have to have a look over there tomorrow Doctrine, there was an interesting programme on R4 last Wed about how Visa issues were discouraging top scientists from joining UK research groups when the same stringent criteria weren't being applied to (for instance) football transfers.

Science feels so undervalued in the UK, if I were a chemistry teacher I would have to convince people to love the subject because the financial rewards aren't proportional to the work required.

I didn't know that. Mumsnet can be pretty amazing sometimes! I'm off to check it out. Thanks Doctrine.

Fortean Times, now there's a blast from the past!

PS MNHQ has started a Science and Nature Club which I requested a while ago on the back of a discussion thread about physics for girls that lots of feMNists took part in - short topic plug!

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/science_and_nature_club

Abigail I like a bit of gardening myself. I just spotted a link to the Fortean Times on the other website, now there is an odd read.

I'd bring Gardner's World

a lightweight look at the news and an american version I see

The Week is good - get your news in one handy format without too much "Comment" to rile you up! Plus posh properties and a recipe of the week.

kim I don't do tablets either. But I am on the sofa using my laptop :)

I'd bring Private Eye for the cartoons and The Week for the property porn.