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One of my great regrets in life is not going further in Mathematics than I did. As it was, I completed College Algebra at the university and that was my last math course.
My ACT score in Math was a 25. This was hardly outstanding, but it certainly demonstrated that I had some aptitude in the subject.
What I found in public school was that Math was poorly taught as a subject. Let me give some illustrations:
1. All math teachers I had seemed to have that attitude that if you didn't learn the material the very first time it was presented there must be a problem with you. They never seemed to think that patience and going over material more than once might actually work for students like me. I usually had to go over the material more than one time for it to sink in. I remember when I tried to question such teachers being repeatedly told "you were already taught that!". I experienced such embarrassment it often made me afraid to ask a single question.
2. No attempt was ever made to explain how Algebra, Geometry, or any advanced math might help us later on. I never one time remember a teacher saying that if want to be a scientist or engineer that you'd have to know this stuff and know it very well.
3. My high school Algebra teacher was the high school football coach. I do not disparage him for this reason. What I disparage him for was spending almost all his spare time in class talking about football while seeming to have little time to help students struggling with Algebra.
4. My high school Geometry teacher was even worse. He had been a former pro-basketball player when he was younger. He owned a couple of gas stations that he was more interested in managing than he was in teaching class. When he was in class, he engaged in practices that I think today might have gotten him fired or at least seriously warned by school administration.
As it turned out, I went into a career--law--that does not require a great deal of mathematical knowledge. However, even here I've learned that knowledge of graphs, statistics, quadratic, and linear equations has been extraordinarily useful in cross-examining expert witnesses.
Do you think schools are doing a better job teaching math today? I look back at the way it was taught in the 1970's and I think it was almost a crime.
Not a whole lot has changed in many cases from your #1 (I'm the same way as you, by the way). I was in college prep classes so everyone in them was "smart" which may trigger the teacher reaction.
Many teachers have such a wide/deep understanding of their subject, and in many cases it came very easily to them, that they have trouble understanding that not all people have that ability. I teach Econ, and it has always laid out for me, so I always tell my students that if I stop talking "English" to stop me and make me go back and make it understandable. I have a good enough relationship with my kids that there's no problem with that happening, although I will ask what exactly it is they don't understand.
You'll find teachers in every discipline who talk about anything except the subject, work on their outside business, bring in their domestic problems, etc. Still.
What has changed is the advent of global curricula tied in with the various states' high stakes tests that mandate your pacing and learnings.
Unqualified teachers and parents who don't push their kids to learn the subject. I was lucky enough to have a guy who had a master's (and had only quit pursuing a PhD because his wife got pregnant and he wanted to be able to support his kid when it was born) in mathematics as my high school teacher from 9-12. The guy'd even taught at a community college. I was also lucky enough to have parents who pushed me to learn.
Was it ever explained why I needed to learn it? No not really. However, my parents had always said math and science were important for getting a job, and the teacher did use a lot of real world examples in setting up lessons for the day. However, mainly it was the old school belief that all knowledge is useful, and that if it was useless it wouldn't be taught.
There have also been the different "theories" on math and teaching math that were embraced and discarded and embraced and discarded over the years. Fads that lined someone's pocket for a bit until the next fad came along.
Not a whole lot has changed in many cases from your #1 (I'm the same way as you, by the way).
You'll find teachers in every discipline who talk about anything except the subject, work on their outside business, bring in their domestic problems, etc. Still.
What has changed is the advent of global curricula tied in with the various states' high stakes tests that mandate your pacing and learnings.
Pacing is an issue. Sometimes there isn't time to go over the material repeated times because you must move on in order to keep pace. This is where after school tutoring comes in handy. Most schools I know of have some kind of math lab after school that students who need more review can make use of. The question is whether or not they use it.
There have also been the different "theories" on math and teaching math that were embraced and discarded and embraced and discarded over the years. Fads that lined someone's pocket for a bit until the next fad came along.
I am convinced that you could start with just about any program (let's leave out "fuzzy" math), keep what works, modify what doesn't and, within a few years have a program that works. Changing how math is taught every few years does no one any good except the book publishers.
I don't think it is poorly taught. I think it is not taught to enough students, so the national average test score is low. Math above basic arithmetic is not mandatory for anybody, so most students probably don't even take algebra.
I don't think math is that important, as such, but it would be nice if more students were required to take courses that required analytical thinking and problem-solving.
I don't think it is poorly taught. I think it is not taught to enough students, so the national average test score is low. Math above basic arithmetic is not mandatory for anybody, so moststudents probably don't even take algebra.
I don't think math is that important, as such, but it would be nice if more students were required to take courses that required analytical thinking and problem-solving.
More like 90+% take at least one Algebra course. My system in MD requires Algebra I and II along with Geometry for graduation. MD State Department of Education requires only I and Geometry.
I don't know about math teaching. I know I suck at math. I used to think it was some early math trauma and I had math anxiety. After high school when in the service and later working various cities/states I must have tested into and (re)taken the same remedial math classe 4 different times at different community colleges. I was trying to make up for giving up on math in about..1st grade where I did have a bad first year experience (big class unhappy nun you get the picture)
I never could catch on. I do think part of it is anxiety. But have also decided that I'm just missing that lobe of my brain or some remnant alien DNA that math smart people have
I really tried over a period of several years. I ended up driving home from night classes crying. It got to where my boyfriend or the tutoring lab person would be trying to help me and I just couldn't understand it and I would start to tear up. I remember later when in full time college (public ivy 4 yr university) at the math tutor lab this asian student trying to get me to understand something very basic in the very basic math class I had to pass in order to graduate and I was just clueless - he gave me this look like he just couldn't believe how stupid I was.
I really love science but I had to move on and just get a B.A. in liberal arts because you can't take even basic science without a pretty good set of math classes as pre-req's whether you need it or not.
I don't know how my brain works but I think I learn a little differently than many. I may have had some better success early on if different approaches were used. "Don't understand? let me explain it a different way".
But honestly? Even though I know (now) I'm not stupid I don't think I ever would have gotten it. Just like some people are tone deaf.
Honestly? I still to this day cannot add (or anything else) a fraction.
People who do get it don't understand people who just don't. And it shows.
And math made me think I was a worthless retard for years. I really just bumped along in school, didn't try. I had to do some serious catchup and bootstrapping later.
One thing that pi**es me off is that whole - "if you try hard enough you can be anything" why tell kids that? Its SOOOO not true. I can be very literal. Take that at face value and as soon as you work hard and it still doesn't happen - you think there is something really wrong with you. Wrong message!
So I got a 4 year degree (all pretty good grades except for the 1 math class required which I barely passed and immediately brain dumped), am in my 50s, do decently in a white collar job. I stay away from math. Stay away from job opportunities that might require it. Refuse to do the most basic public math. Hire people to do anything math related I need.
PS. I was in (catholic) elementary school in the...60s, went to public school starting in 5th grade.
We would never allow this excuse for someone who could not learn to read. Why should we allow it for math?
I will tell you I think that you *can* learn, but teaching has to be adjusted to the way your brain works. Do you play a musical instrument? If so, you are doing fractions when you count 1/2, 1/4 notes and dotted notes. You may never have thought of it that way, but you *are* adding fractions in your music.
In order to learn college math, you might have to start over with very basic arithmetic, but I encourage you to do this rather than to limit yourself even though you are 50.
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