Matt L,

English is the only language I speak, read and write, I do speak other languages, but can't read or write them. Since you keep insisting that there are fictional errors in my post, kindly elaborate on them, I checked them with a spell checker and found none so maybe its time to update your dictionary.

Forget about Lang's Algebra, I have taken absolute gone and condemned I don't do math cases to Simpson's rule and beyond, point is that the student has to be genuinely motivated, without that, nothing is possible, most students who are not motivated will not even learn basic writing, history or for that matter any other subject, math doesn't need special skills to be taught, just that most households now resort to the dreaded calculator thereby bypassing the first skills of basic numerals. Out in the streets here, little kids without calculators will do math with their brains, this is the stepping stone all kids need, fundamentals like tables, addition and subtraction, multiplication are all made so complex today by teachers and the materials, by the time a 1st grader gets to it, he or she is totally bored.

Spell checkers don't find everything. For example, when you substitute another word in an inappropriate place, such as using "inn" when you mean "in." Reminds me of a story told to me by a colleague who had worked as a civil engineer, and a paper about some "pubic roads" in the area. Yea, they had spell-checkers too.

If you would be so kind, could you please restate that first paragraph? I really don't know what you are saying.

Recall that I agree that anyone can comprehend high-school algebra, given enough effort. The comprehension of arithmetic should be assumed. However, high-school algebra comes to many people with no effort whatsoever. There is a difference. The former should only attempt higher mathematics with great trepidation; the same is true for most of the latter.

As I said, education is all about conditioning, some houses do art, history, comprehension from childhood, so the kid will have an excellent grasp of these subjects in high school level, for the kids who do well in HS algebra, its their background and conditioning, a math challenged parent will bring math challenged kids who will grow up in absolute fear of math. That doesn't mean that the kid is condemned to a life without math, with proper guidance, patience and training, he or she can become a math wiz, have done that many a times so nothing surprising.

I completely disagree that education is about conditioning. Only rote learning has that characteristic, and that's not a very good way to become talented at anything.

Apparently, we have very different ideas of what a "math whiz" would be.

As a junior, I'm taking precalculus and will be taking ap calc next year. I never do my homework, yet still pass with a high B. There are also juniors at my school taking a class i forgot the name of, but its basically prealgebra... I wouldn't say education is poor, only that some people choose not to make an attempt and will fail no matter what. I know one of the people in the prealg class, who is fairly intelligent, but just doesn't care...

Dunno what your idea is, but to me, anyone who can beat the labelling of being a math no good and go on to do post grad in a math intensive subject is a math wiz to me. Education is conditioning and motivating, only through that, one gets to be good at it. If we show kids that its OK to play baseball or basketball and earn millions, why would the kid be motivated to do math, OTOH, show the kids the future benefit of math and science and other so called hard subjects, you will see most of them excelling. There are many countries where huge number of students go into engineering and other math related subjects, they do quite well too, now this is purely what I am trying to define, conditioning is all about it, guess if they were elsewhere, it wouldn't be possible in the least.

Still didn't see the alleged spelling mistakes, maybe it has to do with my location :)

inn in place of in:)

:) Thats a typo and not a mistake, as I said, was 12 midnight so mind was not in the best shape to write.

You bet I am, and a big one at that as well, enough to go in from one side and come out of the other:D

= 7A656E2069732000000000000000 in hex, approx 2482490098594123200000000000000000 in decimal, with roundoff error... i don't think anyone wants that many 0s pasted into here :D it'd probably fill the entire hard drive on the database server

edit: actually both have roundoff.. can't find software accurate enough to convert such a big number without rounding, and don't feel like writing my own

Perfect.

I think so, too.

Also, I believe it is nearly impossible to differentiate somebody who is math-o-phobic from somebody who hasn't the requisite horsepower. Worse, our general system of education does kids no favors with the methods used to teach math to youngsters.

Some classes can be quite large and still effective -- like athletics. Other classes like reading and math should be taught in very small groups with lots of interaction. Both are language tools and language tools require communication of ideas. Sitting in a large class working sheets of math drill or reading "Dick & Jane" is brain sabotage.

I read a study recently where they took kids of different countries and gave them all the same math test.
Kids from the US did fair or average. Japanese kids did above average.

Then they went to all the kids and asked them how they felt about the test.
The Japanese kids said they they could have done better.
The kids from the US said they felt good about the test.

We here in the US have conditioned ourselves to feel good about our failures.

I have heard it from teachers too. They are not allowed to tell kids their wrong or correct them. It may "damage their frail ego's". What kind of BS is that?

Danny

I believe you in India, and China and the rest of the world, teach math the same way we in the US used to teach it 40 years ago. Since then we've been "educated" by those with education degrees and our scores on various tests show this. All the while spending more per child on education than any other country in the world.

We, my wife and I, have found this gentleman here to provide a very useful math program which, in our case, improved the math abilities of a 13 year old drastically when compared to what he was receiving in public schools.

You are absolutely correct and the systemath is the only way to go if you wish humans to learn math. By the way, India and China teach math the way it was done there for thousands of years, Abacus is one example in China and in India, the whole process of counting, tables, addition, subtraction, division and multiplication are taught the way it used to be since ancient times, after all we did give the world numbers, 0, number line and concept of X:)