No doubt this results partly from what is taught and the way it is taught, and partly from attitudes picked up incidentally very early in schooling from parents and teachers who are themselves ill at ease with science and mathematics. Far from dismissing math and science anxiety as groundless, though, teachers should assure students that they understand the problem and will work with them to overcome it. After all, science itself, as Alfred North Whitehead said, is never quite right. Understanding anything is never absolute, and it takes many forms.
Many students are fearful of using laboratory instruments and other tools.
This fear may result primarily from the lack of opportunity many of them have to become familiar with tools in safe circumstances. Girls in particular suffer from the mistaken notion that boys are naturally more adept at using tools. Starting in the earliest grades, all students should gradually gain familiarity with tools and the proper use of tools. By the time they finish school, all students should have had supervised experience with common hand tools, soldering irons, electrical meters, drafting tools, optical and sound equipment, calculators and computers. Because the scientific and engineering professions have been predominantly male and white, female and minority students could easily get the impression that these fields are beyond them or are otherwise unsuited to them.