SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Submitted via IRC for chromas
Think you're bad at math? You may suffer from 'math trauma'
I teach people how to teach math, and I've been working in this field for 30 years. Across those decades, I've met many people who suffer from varying degrees of math trauma – a form of debilitating mental shutdown when it comes to doing mathematics.
When people share their stories with me, there are common themes. These include someone telling them they were "not good at math," panicking over timed math tests, or getting stuck on some math topic and struggling to move past it. The topics can be as broad as fractions or an entire class, such as Algebra or Geometry.
[...] One of the biggest challenges U.S. math educators face is helping the large number of elementary teachers who are dealing with math trauma. Imagine being tasked with teaching children mathematics when it is one of your greatest personal fears.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 05 2018, @02:43PM (3 children)
You're completely full of shit. If you can calculate 8x7 faster than remember that it's 56, then you're doing something very wrong. You might be fast at calculating it, but you're certainly not faster than I am at just remembering that 8x7 is 56, that happens completely instantaneously. If it takes any time at all, then it's not properly memorized. I'm capable of multiplying 2 and 3 digit numbers in my head and generally getting them right because I have my 12x12 table memorized, which is good if you're in the US where we still use inches and feet, and use them to generate the needed values.
As for your assertion that I don't really understand math, that's a load of bullshit right there. You shouldn't need to be taught how to use a mouse because it's bloody fucking obvious. The thing has like 2 buttons, a scroll wheel and you roll it around. Chances are a toddler would accidentally discover most of the functions without being taught. Basic arithmetic and number theory are incredibly important to learning and using math.
It's ignorant people like you that clearly have no clue as to what you're doing that damage people more than anything else. Being able to do arithmetic is absolutely essential to doing any sort of meaningful math as it's the basis for things like number sense and determining whether the answer you've got makes sense. Good luck dealing with more complicated math if you can't estimate whether a result is within the realm of possibility.
As far as the use of x as a multiplication symbol goes, nice strawman. Considering the complete lack of any evidence of mathematical literacy on your part, you just assume that I shouldn't have done that and the reality is that there's nothing at all wrong with it. I just don't have a fancy font to use. Using an x is more or less what's done up until algebra and we only stop doing it then because we start using it as a variable name. And we then get back to it sometime either in pre-calculus or calculus when we learn about dot products and cross products.
But, you're claim that it's wrong to do it is complete bullshit. It just takes somebody who isn't a freaking moron to understand the notation. Literally and 3rd grader should be able to read it properly.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 05 2018, @10:42PM (2 children)
Get over yourself.
There are life skills: Tying your shoes, adding money to your checking account, having friends, and evening having a conversation.
There are deep thought skills... mathematics in one of them.
You can be ass and not get it.
I meet a college professor. many, many years ago at party... He had friends that would help get him dressed, made sure he ate, drove him to school, appointments and events... He was basically a non-functional human. Now they would take him parties, put him in corner, put a drink in hand and then seed the party with questions about CHAOS THEORY. That was the "coin" that brought out this man, this mind. He would light up and talk theory and patterns, problems left unsolved and go and go. He got me to think about the math world is left behind for computers. and actually write some fractal programs for the IBM PC (8086) in BASIC, taking an hour or so to graph the image on the green screens.
YES, their are people that do basic math all the time in their with LARGE and small number of digits. Just because you assume others have the only skill you have for basic numbers is a DIV-0 eror on your part.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 06 2018, @05:34AM (1 child)
Knowing your 10x10 times table isn't a deep skill it's routinely done by grade school students. If you haven't done it by 4th grade there's something wrong. People all over the world routinely learn and use basic arithmetic on a daily basis.
I'm sorry that you're suffering from such an obvious intellectual disability, but that doesn't change the fact that this is a necessary life skill.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 06 2018, @04:38PM
Go and look up school house rock and why it came to exist
Mean sit down and shut up