Why Algebra?

Why Do We Teach Algebra?

Until recent history, mathematics had not been taught to the general population. Only those who were rich, powerful, and/or politically connected were given the opportunity to study math beyond basic counting operations. Many of my junior high students are excited about the prospects of returning to this situation. I have the opportunity to teach remedial math and math study skills courses for a local university. Many of the college students with whom I am involved are going back to school after many years in the work force. Most of them experience a high degree of math anxiety because they have forgotten much of the algebra they learned in school. They've forgotten it because they don't use algebra in their daily lives. In fact, many college students are quite successful in their various programs of study and yet struggle to pass their general algebra requirements. And almost everyone breaks into a cold sweat at the mere mention of the words "story problems". Given the high anxiety level associated with the subject and the fact that so much of what we learn in algebra is not used by the general population, why is it so important that we teach it? Be honest! When was the last time you needed to factor a polynomial or to find the asymptotes in a rational expression. Unless you must use these ideas in your work, your answer is probably "huh?"

Don't get me wrong, I think there are compelling reasons to teach algebra to the general population. The first reason, of course, is utility. We use much of the algebra we've learned every day. For example, the ordering properties of our real number system are the basis for almost all of our comparisons--deciding which cereal is cheaper, alphabetizing lists, etc, etc, etc. Negative numbers are useful in balancing our checkbooks--bummer! Of course, we add, subtract, multiply, and divide practically every day. I could go on and on. Most of the problem solving we do has a mathematical basis. Even "he loves me, he loves me not" is a simple mathematical progression--i.e.1, -1, 1, -1,...

Another reason we should learn algebra is to enhance our pattern recognition skills. Pattern recognition is an important problem solving skill. If I can make a problem match a similar previously solved pattern, then the current problem is solved. This is a powerful tool. So powerful, in fact, that a mathematician’s work is more involved with determining whether a solution exists than actually finding the solution.