Briefly and some decades ago I had a math tutor. I sucked at math to a startling degree. The problem was the "problems" they set before me. It was always one of those "If a train leaves (whatever) station at 3. p.m. going (so many) miles an hour, and a different train is leaving another (effing) station at 3:15 p.m. going (who gives a shit) miles an hour, which train...
You get the picture. No sooner did this so-called tutor somehow cram the solution into my thick skull then he'd announce, "Of course, there's another way to arrive at the same answer. Now let's try this other method just for fun!" It was hopeless. I was looking out the window, entirely dumbfounded, and asking the most inappropriate questions. "Was it snowing at the time? Who blew the whistle? How many salmon sandwiches were in the traveling bag?"
7 comments:
I confess, I used to love math and the which-train-gets-there-faster? or what-time-will-it-be-when-the-trains-collide? problems. They never got me anywhere in life, but I loved them. And probably still would, except my computational skills seem to be vacationing in some desert neurons.
Ha... the problem with throwing story problems at someone with a literary mindset.
I was never bad at math, but never got into it. Now I sort of wish I had studied it more. I make up for it with Latin.
I loved math when I took the time to understand it. Something about the absoluteness of the answer.
Did someone say salmon sandwiches?
I was never any good at math in general, but I always excelled at the word problems. I never knew what to do with a bunch of numbers scribbled on the page.
2x-3y/2=7? Come on now, that's just crazy gibberish. But words? Now, they make actual sense.
I hated math until I taught it at the middle school level. That's when I realized that the only good math teachers are people who are bad at and hate math. Folks like your "let's do it again!" tutor? Good for them for liking math. But no good for their students.
I appreciate a nice algebra or trig problem. I still don't like geometry. At all.
i loved the formulaic part of maths, Joya's 2x-3y/2=7, for example. I hated having to apply it into when trains leave. Practical applications? Pah!
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