A Math Story Pt. 2

Pre-College Issues High School Life
1

<p>Get ready for it........!</p>

<p>I hate math, anything involving numbers and me working too hard = unhappy fella, I can't stand it. I'm in pre-cal and it's just really, really, really bad. I thought I hated math before, but this class makes me want to punch a window. We took a test last week and got them back today. Before I proceed, My test average in that class is about a D. I was so ready for a C and was going to throw a party If got one, but I didn't..... I got another D on the friggn' test! I worked my arse off for this dumb test and read the book to touch on the subjects I didn't understand and did eight, EIGHT pages of work! a week before the test. I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I feel like math is a subject that only a select few understand.....it's like a secretive magical language that only a few nerds only understand. My teacher asked what's up with my performance, and I just shrugged my shoulders and said, "I have no clue...." I came in to tutoring one day and thought that would help....nope. My best friend tutored me....NOPE! My friend asked me one day, "Why didn't you take stat & prob," I said to her, "I suck at that too, ask my AP biology teacher...-.-" </p>

<p>I've always sucked at algebra and stats since elementary school and I've been barely pushing through it. I had to retake algebra one again freshman year, and proud of it! I basically proved to myself, that no matter how hard I work, nothing comes out of it. I have a D in the class right now and managed to get a C last term lol. I hate not being able to understand it. I H.A.T.E.D AP chemistry, and pre-calc easily made AP chemistry my favorite class. AP chemistry is so much easier than pre-calc, true story.</p>

<p>Moral of the story: math isn't my thing, I can't decipher it's magical language and utilize it for my benefit. I found out the hard way that math isn't for everyone, especially fellas like me.</p>

2

<p>Not trying to be mean, but I’ve gotta ask…
You hate math and struggled with the AP chem test. You want to major in toxicology why? </p>

<p><a href=“http://agsci.psu.edu/students/resources/handbook/baccalaureate-degrees/degree-tox/TOX.pdf[/url]”>http://agsci.psu.edu/students/resources/handbook/baccalaureate-degrees/degree-tox/TOX.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

3

<p>Toxicology isn’t math intensive if we’re going by the plan you provided. Now the chemistry…</p>

4

<p>Turns out high school math classes over-represent the hard work of working with numbers and under-represent the joy of logic in mathematics. I’ve maintained for a long time that mathematics isn’t what people think it is. I read [this</a> book](<a href=“http://books.google.com/books/about/Mathematics_A_Very_Short_Introduction.html?id=DBxSM7TIq48C]this”>Mathematics: A Very Short Introduction - Timothy Gowers - Google Books) recently and it does a great job of explaining what I mean. Despite its boilerplate title, it’s not a “for dummies” kind of tutorial franchise; it’s actually not a tutorial at all, rather it’s written to get people who think of math as working with numbers to see it instead as a huge field of critical thinking.</p>

<p>For starters, you’d be baffled by the range of math in which the real numbers simply have no meaning, where the integers or even the natural numbers are all you need.</p>

5

<p>People in my school know just how you feel. One of my teachers said its that no one can really teach precalculus good and that you should ask another teacher for help on the assignments.</p>

6

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<p>Ha~ You’re not the only one who said that. Like stated above, it may be very weird, but the fact that math gave me intense headaches, I really pushed myself in AP chemistry and right now I have an A because I did well on the last two test, quizzes and labs. Remember Sue22, most science majors, natural and physical, require calculus to graduate from undergrad.</p>

7

<p>It looks like the most you’ll do is Calc II, which isn’t bad. You’ll be fine, kid. Got faith in ya. <em>pats Fantasy on the back</em></p>