Poker To Teach Math? - Pt 1 of Game Theory

A grade school program in the United States has 9-year olds playing chess as a means of gaining concentration and developing math and other skills. So far, according to the participants, it appears to be a success.

I’m wondering if card-playing could also be used to teach similar skills.

Having myself been a math geek in past years, and having been a college computer science teaching assistant, I’ve noticed that math has always been a problem for North American students.

I volunteered at my old high school, 15 years ago, as a math tutor for a couple of students having difficulties. One student got suspended because of other activities. The other student hung out with me at the local college and became my photography assistant for the weekly university newspaper.

At the time, he had an interest in photography, and I thought that it would be an ideal way to teach him fractions and f-stops at the same time. (It helped him, to a degree. But I didn’t find out until a year ago that he was dyslexic at the time, but hadn’t been diagnosed. He did go on to become a bank manager, but gave that up to become a wine importer. Now he’s wrestling with figuring out import taxes and profit margins.)

This got me to thinking: could cards be a way to teach kids some discipline? At a very basic level, card games are about luck - that is, mathematical odds. Game theory  is all about the odds for all kinds of games.

Kids could learn about the odds, how to calculate their options, and then learn about the consequences of an action. Ultimately, they learn that high odds are never solid ground to base a decision on, without taking all factors into account. In the case of cards (poker, or what have you), the “other factors” are “human nature”.

I was introduced to Game Theory at the age of 12, when I found a book my father had on the subject. I was instantly entranced. It didn’t hurt that my father (now retired) was a math professor. But I’ve also noticed that every good card player I’ve met rarely had difficulties with mathematics and analytic reasoning.

Aside from the stigma of gambling, card-playing - particularly Texas Hold ‘Em - could be a way to teach kids about not only math, stats, game odds, but about people, discipline, consequence, and the dangers of uncontrolled gambling. Or it could just create another generation of gamblers.

Technorati Tags: cards, poker, game theory

Related Posts

• Poker at college
• Differences between good and great
• Do Your Hand Odds Change Depending On The Number Of Players?
• Humans Remain the Poker Champs
• Advanced Poker Odds Calculations

« Previous Post | Next Post »

Leave a Comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.