getting over math phobia

[ny biker]

I don't know of any courses, but I've always thought that there was probably a big psychological barrier for many people who aren't good with math. I know some people have more of an aptitude for it than others, but thinking "I can't do math" -- or hearing your parents say it when you start bringing home poor grades in it -- can't possibly make things easier.

FWIW, the math lightbulb went on in my head one night when I was doing geometry homework in 9th grade. It just took lots of practice, doing the same kinds of problems over and over until the patterns started to make sense intuitively. And just working with numbers a lot made things fall into place. I did struggle with calculus and statistics in later high school and college, but a lot of that was because I didn't fully understand the basic concepts before we moved onto more complex things, so I got lost quickly.

I took 2 semesters of statistics in college, so I was pretty good at it by the time I had to take another semester of it in grad school. Many of my classmates in grad school had been English majors who kept saying "I just can't do math." And the teacher went too fast for them -- he really did not explain things well. So we formed a study group to go over the homework assignments very slowly, to give everyone a chance to ask questions and understand things at a slower pace. I told them at the beginning that they had to stop saying that they couldn't do math -- just forget that and focus on the task at hand. We just all worked together and everyone made it through the class. And then they bought me beer after finals...

Another thing -- my most excellent high school algebra teacher, Mr. Foerster, taught us something that has been very helpful to me. He told us there is nothing worse than a blank page. Get your feeling of confidence by writing down what you know, so the page won't be blank anymore. Write your name. Write "Question 1." If it's a word problem that says "Moe, Joe and Zoey are going camping in Glacier National Park, and Moe bought 6 cans of Spam for $0.50 each," then write "x=6" and "y=0.50." If you'll be setting up an equation in the form of "a/b = x/y" write the lines and the equal sign. When the page is no longer blank, it helps your brain start thinking.

(Most of Mr. Foerster's word problems involved Moe, Joe and Zoey going camping in Glacier National Park with many cans of Spam. If he ever became ruler of the world, he planned to make Glacier National Park the capital. I can't remember what I did at work yesterday, but I will never forget that.)

[indysteel]

I did okay in high school with Algebra and Geometry, but really struggled with Trig. My parents got a tutor from a local university (I think he was a math grad student) for me who was exceedingly patient. He helped me gain a lot more confidence. By the time I took Calculus, I had a better idea on how to approach the material. It ultimately clicked. I remember getting a letter at graduation from my math teacher. She told me how proud she was of me and my diligence. I ended up taking several Calculus classes in college--one a requirement and one an elective--and doing rather well. While I will never be a math person, I am a big fan of working one on one with a good teacher or tutor, especially one who appreciates that different people respond to different teaching methods. If I had to tackle math again, I wouldn't hestitate to get a tutor from the get-go.

[jessmarimba]

I was a math minor and I took several equation-based classes, but the class that I really enjoyed (called Foundations of Higher Math or something equally as descriptive) was sort of a concept/language based course. Not like word problems like Moe, Joe, and Zoey, but concepts like and, or, and not, etc. I'm not sure how to describe it, it was almost like taking a computer programming class that was translated for the other side of your brain (and trust me, it was the total opposite. I got a D in my C++ class, and a 97 in this class). Our textbook was about a quarter of an inch thick, labeled something like "logistics" and it just made everything make so much sense.

I think a lot of math phobics are people who have always been taught to approach math the same way, and the way math is almost always taught appeals to the wrong side of a math phobics brain. Even standard word problems don't really manage to circumvent the usual approach. And since math teachers are people who "got" math, they can't see how to teach it any differently than what works for them.

[GLC1968]

I think a lot of math phobics are people who have always been taught to approach math the same way, and the way math is almost always taught appeals to the wrong side of a math phobics brain. Even standard word problems don't really manage to circumvent the usual approach. And since math teachers are people who "got" math, they can't see how to teach it any differently than what works for them.

This. Big time.

I was good at math as a child but when I changed HS middle of my freshman year, I got tracked at a level lower than the good math students and while I got 'A's in the courses I did take, they weren't the tough math courses. I ended up in college in a sociology major because I just didn't gravitate towards math anymore because I felt I'd missed out on so much and was 'behind'. My best grade in my enitre sociology degree was in my statistics classes but that still didn't enlighten me.

Fast forward a decade or so and I found myself back in school with a bent towards engineering because I really, really enjoyed calculus now that I was taking it (finally). And I was getting all A's because math (and science) came easy to me. Who knew? Funny thing was, I was also asked by my calculus teacher to tutor because I seemed to have a different approach to the problems than the other students. I ended up tutoring algebra (not calculus) and really helping some math phobics 'get it' because I came at everything in a different way than their teachers or text books did. For me, it was about seeing the problem as they saw it and then finding a way to explain it that made sense to them. Of course, as a tutor working in a one-on-one situation, I had a luxury that teachers don't have. I could custom tailor my approach.

Anyway, for anyone who can't 'get' math - a good tutor can make all the difference. And I would also say that if you can't find a good tutor, keep looking. Finding one you connect with is KEY and one size does not fit all.

[badger]

my boyfriend and I looked at some math problems online. I was able to remember a lot of the algebra ones, but oh.my.goodness, I was so sorely lost with trigonometry. Sin, Cos, Tan, yikes!! I remember having a horrible go of it, and like back then, my mind quickly shut down. It was quite sad.

He's reading a book on quantum physics right now, and I must say most of what he's telling me is utter gibberish to me.

[Owlie]

my boyfriend and I looked at some math problems online. I was able to remember a lot of the algebra ones, but oh.my.goodness, I was so sorely lost with trigonometry. Sin, Cos, Tan, yikes!! I remember having a horrible go of it, and like back then, my mind quickly shut down. It was quite sad.

He's reading a book on quantum physics right now, and I must say most of what he's telling me is utter gibberish to me.

Remember, if you think you understand quantum physics, you don't understand quantum physics.

[pll]

I was a math minor and I took several equation-based classes, but the class that I really enjoyed (called Foundations of Higher Math or something equally as descriptive) was sort of a concept/language based course. Not like word problems like Moe, Joe, and Zoey, but concepts like and, or, and not, etc. I'm not sure how to describe it, it was almost like taking a computer programming class that was translated for the other side of your brain (and trust me, it was the total opposite. I got a D in my C++ class, and a 97 in this class). Our textbook was about a quarter of an inch thick, labeled something like "logistics" and it just made everything make so much sense.

Sounds like formal logic to me... loved that subject when I was an undergrad!

[roo4]

I don't know of any courses, but I've always thought that there was probably a big psychological barrier for many people who aren't good with math. I know some people have more of an aptitude for it than others, but thinking "I can't do math" -- or hearing your parents say it when you start bringing home poor grades in it -- can't possibly make things easier.

I read an article in Scientific American a couple years back. The gist was that some people consider math skills to be innate, and some think of it as something that can be gained with practice. This meant that when kids were faced with a math problem, some kids didn't attempt it because they thought they "couldn't do math" and others considered it to be a challenge or a puzzle to be solved. Leave the "can't" behind and think of it as a mountain to be climbed. Perhaps slowly, but so what?

[PscyclePath]

I have a minor in math and a master's degree in p-chem, but am still strictly a cookbook mathematician when it gets above basic algebra ;-) Once I look up the equation, I can usually get it right, but I do have to go back to the books and slavishly follow the "recipe."

Tom

[Owlie]

My majors were biology and chemistry. No way I could avoid it. And I loved chemistry, but math has always been my weak subject--even compared to English. I did pretty well in geometry, but struggled with algebra and precalc. And in college, I got a D in the semester of calculus that covered derivatives but got a very high B in the semester that covered integrals (over the summer!). I did pretty well in statistics, but I'm pretty sure that's because it was a joke--open book/open note tests, for example.

What I think worked with these courses was "I need to do well..." and as I started doing my homework and checking my answers (or getting my engineering student BF do check them for me) I realized that I was actually getting them right. Helped my confidence enormously.

That doesn't mean I went into chemistry (I don't have the math skills for physical chemistry, nor the spatial reasoning for organic), or that I'm not still a little apprehensive about the biostatistics course I have coming up...