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Old 02-01-2010, 06:00 PM
 
270 posts, read 502,349 times
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I've passed the first half of pre-cal, at the place where I took it it was divided into two courses-precalculus and precalculus/ trigonometry, but I will confess I had to look up formulas a lot. I don't know where I would place now. I haven't had math in a while. I might have to re-learn algebra II. I think I will try and take a load of classes at a local community college after I graduate. Depending on how helpful the teachers are, I may even practice a little before I get there. I can do well if a teacher is willing to invest a little time with me and break the lessons down. I'm a creative person and an analytic thinker, but for some reason math escapes me unless I spend a lot of time with it and give it a place in my everyday life. After I know how to "translate" it, though, it shouldn't be hard at all. That will likely take a while, though, and I may need plenty of support.
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Old 02-01-2010, 09:37 PM
 
Location: Sandpoint, Idaho
3,007 posts, read 6,256,602 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by collegestudentfromalabama View Post
Hi, I'm currently majoring in English/ Secondary Education, and I discovered my math skills are a bit below par after trying to tutor for the math part of the ACT. It was a little embarrassing. I ended up looking through the book and calling certain students to work the problems. I was quite interested myself, because I had forgotten a lot of the work, so I guess they were really teaching me!

I know English teachers generally don't like math, but I think I'm more interested in teaching learning than teaching literature, so I don't know if I will remain an English teacher. Math teachers are more in demand, anyway. To learn math though, I would have to have a way to make the formulas very easy to remember, among other things. For some reason, it's easier for me to sit down with a piece of writing, even dense philosophy, and churn out a paper, than for me to sit down and do an advanced math problem. I can sit down and memorize a long list of words with very little effort, but I can't seem to do so well with a list of numbers. My brain seems geared toward language, but spatial perception, shapes, and numbers all might confuse me easily, especially if they appear together.

I would have a long way to go if I wanted to become a math expert. Even though I've worked pretty hard, I've only gotten past the first half of pre-calculus. I flunked the second part. Math has never been one of my strengths. In fact, I've struggled with it. The math professor at the university I attend complicated one of the classes further by requiring us to make no less than 80 percent on each one of our homework assignments. This means that if you made lower than 80 on ONE of your homework assignments, you failed the class. Talk about pressure. I wish they had an anxiety-free math course for English teachers who want to teach math. Does anyone have any suggestions? I don't think I want to take another math course at this college. It feels like sink or swim, and no one's taught me how to swim. Math is part of the academic core, though. Why am I being taught to hate it?
CollegeStudent,
I don't want to play the role of the naysayer, but if you (a) dislike math, (b) are not good at math, and (c) have trouble seeing the point of math, then I do not think you should be a teacher and most certainly would not want you to teach my kids.

You should consider a high school credential in a subject you are good in. Avoid elementary/secondary school where you would teach all subjects.

Best, S.
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Old 02-01-2010, 11:56 PM
 
270 posts, read 502,349 times
Reputation: 103
Well, an English teacher is better than no teacher at all, and the children I will be responsible for educating will hopefully appreciate me. I may also sub for the other subjects from time to time just to broaden my perspective. Yes, I think I should use caution if I want to pursue mathematics, but I think if I developed the skill for it, I would learn it well. If I learned it well, I could teach it well enough. Thank you all for your input, though, and I may talk to some math teachers and advisors about this pursuit. I may also look into going for a masters degree and teaching English as a Second Language, or maybe teach at a junior college. Again, thank you all.
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Old 02-02-2010, 01:09 AM
 
Location: San Francisco, CA
15,088 posts, read 13,386,516 times
Reputation: 14266
Quote:
Originally Posted by collegestudentfromalabama View Post
Hi, I'm currently majoring in English/ Secondary Education, and I discovered my math skills are a bit below par after trying to tutor for the math part of the ACT. It was a little embarrassing. I ended up looking through the book and calling certain students to work the problems. I was quite interested myself, because I had forgotten a lot of the work, so I guess they were really teaching me!

I know English teachers generally don't like math, but I think I'm more interested in teaching learning than teaching literature, so I don't know if I will remain an English teacher. Math teachers are more in demand, anyway. To learn math though, I would have to have a way to make the formulas very easy to remember, among other things. For some reason, it's easier for me to sit down with a piece of writing, even dense philosophy, and churn out a paper, than for me to sit down and do an advanced math problem. I can sit down and memorize a long list of words with very little effort, but I can't seem to do so well with a list of numbers. My brain seems geared toward language, but spatial perception, shapes, and numbers all might confuse me easily, especially if they appear together.

I would have a long way to go if I wanted to become a math expert. Even though I've worked pretty hard, I've only gotten past the first half of pre-calculus. I flunked the second part. Math has never been one of my strengths. In fact, I've struggled with it. The math professor at the university I attend complicated one of the classes further by requiring us to make no less than 80 percent on each one of our homework assignments. This means that if you made lower than 80 on ONE of your homework assignments, you failed the class. Talk about pressure. I wish they had an anxiety-free math course for English teachers who want to teach math. Does anyone have any suggestions? I don't think I want to take another math course at this college. It feels like sink or swim, and no one's taught me how to swim. Math is part of the academic core, though. Why am I being taught to hate it?
Here's why you can churn out a paper and memorize a long list of word but have problems with math: math is not about memorization and regurgitation. It is the quintessential exercise that emphasizes the application of concepts into on-the-spot reasoning rather than memorizing. In many ways, this is harder than memorizing a bunch of stuff on autopilot - and so people like to avoid it.

There is some stuff to memorize in math, to be sure, but you can't memorize your way through it; you need to develop a strong conceptual understanding of what you're doing and why. Otherwise, when it comes to the first problem that looks a little bit different than one you thought you "learned", you're immediately lost. In general, if you want to develop complex understanding, you focus on the concept rather than trying to memorize all the details.

All of this is not to say that you just look at the problem and say "ah, I get the concept now" - that won't work. You'll have to do a ton of problems of all varieties, but focus the learnings on the concept, not the final fact of the answer and make sure you understand why. Once you start to develop that foundation, you can build on it by applying it to other situations. It's real mental work...there's no way around it.
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Old 02-02-2010, 06:30 AM
 
Location: Conejo Valley, CA
12,460 posts, read 19,992,436 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by collegestudentfromalabama View Post
To learn math though, I would have to have a way to make the formulas very easy to remember, among other things.
No, get that out of your head. Mathematics is not about memorization, its about analysis of mathematical objects. Start thinking about mathematics like Philosophy with symbols.

Quote:
Originally Posted by collegestudentfromalabama View Post
Why am I being taught to hate it?
You're not, rather you are going into the classes with strong misconceptions about what mathematics is all about. Start fresh, ignore all the symbols at first. Just think about the underlying concepts and then think about how the symbols represent these concepts and how you can use them to manipulate mathematical ideas.

The symbolization is a tool in mathematics, it is not the principle activity of mathematics. The ancient Greeks were doing mathematics before any of this symbolization was created.

I would suggest perhaps you take a class in logic before you try another class in mathematics.
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Old 02-02-2010, 06:41 AM
 
Location: Sandpoint, Idaho
3,007 posts, read 6,256,602 times
Reputation: 3310
Quote:
Originally Posted by collegestudentfromalabama View Post
Well, an English teacher is better than no teacher at all, and the children I will be responsible for educating will hopefully appreciate me. I may also sub for the other subjects from time to time just to broaden my perspective. Yes, I think I should use caution if I want to pursue mathematics, but I think if I developed the skill for it, I would learn it well. If I learned it well, I could teach it well enough. Thank you all for your input, though, and I may talk to some math teachers and advisors about this pursuit. I may also look into going for a masters degree and teaching English as a Second Language, or maybe teach at a junior college. Again, thank you all.
If English is your game, then I wish you well.

You should learn math for its own sake. However, I would not pursue math education to pass some horribly minimum threshold to gain certification as a math teacher. "If I learned it well, I could teach it well enough." Yikes.

However, if you do get that "Ah, Ha!" moment and you begin to really get into it, then share that passion with others.

S.
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Old 02-02-2010, 11:11 AM
 
270 posts, read 502,349 times
Reputation: 103
Good point. Well, I think I want to close this argument pretty soon. Thank you all for sharing your insight. Before I end completely, though, I would like user_id to say a little more about math as philosophy. It may say something about the quality of my math teachers, but I only recently encountered philosophy laid out in terms of math, and, yes, it was in an English class.

Last edited by surburbangirlie; 02-02-2010 at 12:17 PM..
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Old 02-02-2010, 03:50 PM
 
Location: Conejo Valley, CA
12,460 posts, read 19,992,436 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by collegestudentfromalabama View Post
I would like user_id to say a little more about math as philosophy.
Not sure what you want to hear. But mathematics, like philosophy, is all about analyzing concepts and putting them in clearer terms and seeing where they lead. Why there appears to be a big difference between these two fields is that the mathematician almost always insists on formalizing the concepts (essentially symbolizing them) and the mathematician focuses just on "mathematical objects". But the philosopher uses formalization as a tool as well, he just does not insist on it. The philosopher also looks at a more varied subject matter, often things that are very difficult to formalism. But the line between what subjects are part of mathematics and what are not is very fuzzy. But people have misconceptions about philosophy as well, people think its all about the "meaning of life". Yet, you'll rarely find modern philosophers talking about anything close to that subject.

I think the misconceptions about mathematics arise because people think all the symbols are mathematics, where as in philosophy its much harder to make this mistake. Sadly, it is the school system that breeds this misconception.

The process of the mathematician is roughly as follows (and rather similar to the philosopher):
1.) Take an informal idea and analyze it and make it more concrete. That is try to figure out what are the essential figures of the idea.
2.) Once the idea is concrete try to formalize it by creating a set of axioms or similar device.
3.) See where the formalize leads you, what can you generalize about the structure? What are the essential properties? And so on.

The processes is on going, meaning often mathematics will go back to stage 1 and refine the conceptual analysis or go back to 2 and work on the foundational axioms. Usually individual mathematicians are working on just one aspect (i.e., 1, 2 or 3) so the "big picture" is often not so apparent from speaking with one.

If you want an example I can give you one.

Anyhow, if you track where important ideas originated it is almost always in the mind of a philosopher or mathematician. These guys are the ones that make things like science, engineering, etc possible in the first place as these fields all need sufficiently concrete ideas to work with.
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Old 02-02-2010, 05:17 PM
 
Location: Southern Illinois
10,364 posts, read 20,715,965 times
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OP, I will differ from most of the posters here--I think this can be done. If you think you could learn to love math, but for some reason didn't get a firm grasp of it in the beginning, then it would be beneficial to go back and get the basics again. Seek out the very best teachers you can find and ask millions of questions, and learn to understand the formulas as others have mentioned. Learn the rules of thumb and figure out where your sticking points are b/c you can be sure that your students will have some of the same problems you did. Pay close attention to your learning process so you can communicate that to the kids and I think you'd be fine. Sometimes people who get math too well don't make the best teachers of it, b/c they don't understand how you can't understand.

I"m not sure that I buy it that if you don't get it you never will--sometimes I think that poor teaching in the past or the fact that we might have been distracted by something else at a time when we were learning a crucial concept could have a lot to do with poor understanding of math concepts and I know several people who've gone back to relearn (including myself) and understood it much better the next time around. I love what some of you said about philosophy and math--that would be a unique way to approach it in school that you don't see often, and with your English background, you could also translate some of the romance of it, which would make you a very good teacher indeed.
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Old 02-02-2010, 09:51 PM
 
270 posts, read 502,349 times
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Wow, all of this is really interesting. Sure user_id, I wouldn't mind an example. Do you know of a book on math as philosophy or philosophy as math?
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