How dyscalculia nearly stopped me from getting into university.
“Do you understand NOW?”, my teacher sighed. Her frustrated emphasis on the NOW there for all to hear.
I looked up from the equation in front of me. Mrs Marshal hovered over my Maths paper, understandably growing impatient. I was beginning to pity her, having to teach me.
As I had always done for the previous 12 years, I summoned a fake smile.
“Um, yes I think that makes sense now, thank you miss.”
It did not make any sense at all, but my desperation to please my teacher and turn her attention away from me was much stronger than my desire to understand the work.
GCSEs were less than a few months away and I was still struggling with the most basic arithmetic.
“It wasn’t uncommon for my maths exams to end in tears”
My face felt hot. My eyes began to prick with tears. I looked around at my year group, tapping away at their calculators, seemingly happily solving quadratic equations. Some with their arms folded and papers closed, already finished and waiting for the bell to ring.
It wasn’t uncommon for my end of year maths exams to end in tears. It had never been my strong suit, to say the least.
By my final year of secondary school, I was well known among the maths department for being a “challenge” to teach. I shared their exasperation. Theirs with me, mine with the subject.
I didn’t learn to tell the time until I was eight.
Always a little ashamed, I’d made a habit of counting on my fingers under the table to avoid being made fun of, and hid at the back of the classroom, never daring to put my hand up.
I always achieved A’s in English, history, and business, but could barely count to 30 without getting lost.
"I was filled with frustration and embarrassment"
It was practically an inside joke between teachers that I was one of the strongest English students in the year but by far the worst in maths.
A fond memory of mine is my year 11 Maths teacher walking into my English class and being completely stunned to see me in the top set.
Perhaps if the vast difference in my Maths and English skills had been taken seriously by my teachers, I would have passed the first time.
I would break down in almost every lesson, filled with frustration and embarrassment. Why was I still struggling with my timetables?
Why did my peers understand what was going on and I didn’t?
The answer came just weeks before my GCSE exams.
A new teacher had just arrived at school. He was a PE teacher and in fact never took me for any lesson. He arrived all fresh from University where he’d done some specialist work in cognitive psychology. He took one look at me and pretty much immediately identified the problem.
Dyscalculia.
"I felt nothing but relief"
A severe difficulty in making arithmetical calculations, as a result of a brain disorder.
Some students might be upset to hear this news, but I felt nothing but relief.
Finally, the answer to my perceived idiocy had presented itself. I wasn’t stupid.
One of the main changes that came from this discovery was that I took my exams in a small classroom and was allocated extra time.
This benefitted me massively in the subjects I was already doing well in. It turns out poor time management is a symptom of dyscalculia.
The only issue I’d ever had in English was that I always ran out of time in my exams. I now had an extra half an hour to analyse quotes and write essays on ‘Macbeth’ (one of my favourite things to do).
After this confidence boost in my English skills, I decided I wanted to study journalism at university. The only issue being most universities wanted at least a pass in maths from applicants.
Unfortunately, my diagnosis came too late for anything to be done about my mathematical incompetence.
GCSE results day loomed, and after my last maths paper, I had already accepted that I had definitely failed maths.
Desperate to study journalism at university, I spent the next two years at sixth form working incredibly hard to get my maths GCSE.
I moved to a new sixth form college with a much more supportive maths department. I attended extra lessons, drop in sessions and saw various private maths tutors.
Most importantly, with the help of my maths tutor, I was able to come up with new methods to tackle my dyscalculia.
Dyscalculia causes students to struggle with retaining math-related information.
This meant once I understood something I would usually forget it by the time it came to the next question.
To combat this, at the end of every lesson my teacher and I would do a short review of everything we’d learnt that day, which helped me to retain the information.
I also found that breaking down questions into smaller sections helped me to feel less overwhelmed, and slowly my confidence started to build.
In the end, I had to re-sit the exams four times before I eventually passed.
On my last attempt before the end of sixth form, I naturally assumed that I had failed again.
My future in a language-based career hung unjustly in the balance of my dyscalculia.
I scanned the piece of paper anxiously for the result.
I had passed.
It was only by a few marks, but it was a pass. I’d never felt so much relief.
Finally, I could leave my 18-year battle with dyscalculia behind me and start a new chapter at university.
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