"When am I going to use this?"

     “When am I going to use this?” is something most people hear at some point in a math class. Sometimes it is a rhetorical question that is just meant to show the teacher that this information isn’t useful. Sometimes it is a genuine question. I once asked a teacher “When do people use this information?” because I was curious and also, I thought it might help me remember the math. She assumed I was being snarky and told me to stop asking questions like that. I think that it is a good question to ask. But I also think we should respond with real answers instead of telling a student to stop asking questions like that. If we start responding to students who ask the question “When am I going to use this?”, maybe the students will start to see real value in math. A lot of the reason children ask questions like this is because of the attitude surrounding math in the United States. If we raised children to be fearless when it came to math, maybe they would be more interested in learning it. Even if you learn something in math that does not mean a lot to you or it is not something you can use in the future, it is still training your brain. Math will help you stay sharp- minded into old age! Think of math as strength training. If you never exercise, your body will most likely become weaker and less efficient over time. But if you exercise daily whether you are doing a quick warmup, yoga, or a full-blown session, your body is going to be so much stronger! Think of math as strength training for your brain! Another benefit to learning math (even if you are not going to use it ever again), is that it can help you in other subjects too! There are a lot of other subjects that involve a lot of math such as chemistry, physics, biology, and even music. So, if a chemistry student is not interested in learning something in math class, they may not know that the math they are learning can help them in chemistry class! Math is so important. Especially in elementary school and middle school, because it sets the foundation for all other math you will learn in the future. Kids do not usually know what they want to be in elementary school and middle school. But if a kid in elementary school wants to be an astronaut and hates math, a way to get that student motivated could be to teach that student that astronauts have to know a lot of math in order to become an astronaut. So the question “When am I going to use this?” is a wonderful question! We just have to be able to explain to our students that there are a lot of ways we use math!