Institutionalise Mathematics Day every school week — Prof Anku
The Executive Director of Meagasa Mathematics Academy, Professor Sitsofe E. Anku, has called for the institutionalisation of Mathematics Day every school week, where focus is placed on the in-depth teaching and learning of the subject.
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“What we are advocating is Mathematics Day. I hope the schools get it very well... to declare maybe say a Monday as Mathematics Day to study only mathematics for the whole day so that students have sufficient time to interact with the teacher to do more work to understand very well what they are being taught,” he said and pointed out that “we should stop this one period thing.”
Maths camp
Prof. Anku said this in an interview with the Daily Graphic at the closing ceremony of this year’s Mathematics Camp organised by the academy for about 100 basic and second-cycle school students.
He noted that the current educational curriculum must be replanned to give a full day for the study of key subjects for the full participation of students for them to enjoy and appreciate what they were being taught.
He said there was the need to focus on a few subjects such as English, Mathematics, Science and Social Studies for in-depth studies rather than do many subjects half baked.
Time to teach
Prof. Anku noted for instance that the lack of enough time to teach the subject per period was not helpful since it affected the students’ ability to understand the concepts properly.
“If you do not understand the concepts, what are you going to do? If I say fraction and you don’t understand fraction, what are you going to do?” he asked and added that students must understand the concepts in such a way that it would have an impact on them.
Prof. Anku said students needed to understand Mathematics and see its relevance to real life so that they would be able to use its principles and methods to solve problems of real life.
Expansion
He said the camp, which had been organised in the regional capitals, needed to be expanded and sustained through funding, adding that “we have to train the young ones from the beginning because of the large failure in Mathematics. We are saying that they should not be failing. There is a solution to the problem and we are helping to provide that solution.”
Prof. Anku said the current system was too much examination-focused rather than in-depth teaching and understanding of subjects.
He, therefore, called for a replanning of the educational system and stressed that “if we do not do it, we are just joking.”
