Why I begin Algebra 2 with a Spy Novel
I begin my Algebra 2 courses with a spy novel. More specifically, the first chapter of The Man Who Was Thursday by G.K. Chesterton.
G.K. Chesterton was one of the most profound apologist and Christian writers of the early 20th century. His nightmarish thriller begins with a debate between two poets who, in “high oratorical humor” disagree on the meaning of poetry. As out of place as the conversation feels in what is to come of the fast-paced adventure of deception, the thesis on poetry (in Chesterton’s words) “runs like a red thread through those dark and ill-drawn tapestries of the night.”
The incumbent poet of Saffron Park, Gregory, proclaims “An artist is identical with an anarchist… An anarchist is an artist. The man who throws a bomb is an artist, because he prefers a great moment to everything.” Gregory is convinced the true poet is in a constant state of revolt, even in the streets of heaven.
Gregory meets his match, however, when the second poet enters the scene. Syme, a self-professed poet of order declares “what is there poetical about being in revolt? Being sick is a revolt… Revolt in the abstract is-revolting. It’s mere vomiting.”
The two turn their disagreement to the Underground Railway system. If poetry is about order, why do the clerks and navies in the railway train look so sad and tired, posits Gregory. “It is because, they know that whatever place they have taken a ticket for that place they will reach.” How enraptured they might be if the train unaccountably stopped at a station they were not expecting.
Syme responds in kind, “the rare, strange thing is to hit the mark; the gross, obvious thing is to miss it. We feel it is epical when man with one wild arrow strikes a distance bird.” So, when a conductor sets out for a given station, there are many thousands of things that could go wrong. Yet, when the conductor aims the train at Victoria and arrives, it is no less than the victory of Adam.
Am I in the Right Class?
When we begin to tread this story, the students give a confused and skeptical look. ‘Isn’t this Algebra 2?’ they think, ‘why are we reading a story?’
In my tenure teaching Algebra 2, I have found that its placement around 10th grade is prime for anxiety. Algebra 2 students have wide-eyed optimism about their future, and the zeal to ensure it happens exactly how they envision. I have seen students spiral out of control in a haze of anxiety over something as small as a homework problem.
One can almost hear their thoughts:
I must get this problem right or
I won’t get an A on the test,
then I won’t be placed in the honors, t
hen I won’t get into university,
then I won’t get a job,
then I’ll be begging on the side of the road.
So, I have to get this problem right!
This dread provides the sheer adrenaline needed to get the problem correct; but is the student really contemplating the mysteries of mathematics?If mathematics were studied simply for its utility, the buck would stop sometime around Christmas in Algebra 2. During this class numbers become imaginary, and students memorize logarithms that are made almost inadequate by the supercomputer in their pocket. Thankfully, we do not believe mathematics is a study in utility alone.
Indeed, we as Classical Christian Educators believe, as did Plato, that mathematics ought to be studied for its ability to cultivate virtue in the soul.
“It is befitting, then, Glaucon, that this branch of learning should be prescribed by our law and that we should induce those who are to share the highest functions of state to enter upon that study of calculation and take hold of it, not as amateurs, but to follow it up until they attain to the contemplation of the nature of number, by pure thought, not for the purpose of buying and selling, as if they were preparing to be merchants or hucksters, but for the uses of war and for facilitating the conversion of the soul itself from the world of generation to essence and truth.”
Plato, The Republic, Book VII,
Algebra 2 is a gateway to wisdom and beauty for all students. Which is why I clarify on the first day of class that I expect my students to behold the wonder Algebra 2 has to offer for the sake of their souls and not their careers.
Framing Algebra 2 as a debate about the nature of poetry shifts the students’ focus from the temporal applications of mathematics and onto the eternal: the poetry of numbers, the order that illuminates all beauty.I want them to know that when they are factoring quadratics, they are beholding the poetry of order. When students find the solution to an unknown equation, the one number in a sea of infinite numbers, they too can proclaim the victory of Adam.
