Going Insane

Pre-College Issues High School Life
1

<p>Okay...So I am bad at math. It is my only class that is NOT honors, and I struggle to get As in it. I am currently in Alg 2, and next year I am supposed to go to Trig, but I really want to skip that and go straight to PreCalc. But, to do this, I need to get straight As in math this year. Argh.</p>

<p>So here is the delima:
For all of the math quizes, we work in a 3 person group. We have the same group for the entire year and we all get the same grades on all of the quizes. I am paired with a good friend of mine, and a dumb football jock. My friend is HORRIBLE as math. The jock...is also useless. I do all of the work for the quizes while my friend tries her best to do something (everything is always wrong), and the jock sleeps. It ****es me off taht we all get the same grade. </p>

<p>Now, I know that I shouldn't blame my partners for getting bad grades on these quizes, because it is a privledge to be able to do them together, but I take my friend to school, and she is always late! I sit outside of her house for 20 minutes (calling her the entire time) while she takes her sweet time eating breakfast, and I sit there starving in the car. </p>

<p>This is especially irritating when it is a quiz or test day, and I wake up early to ask the teacher questions. Sometimes we have vocab stuff about math on the quizes, so I tell her to study that as much as possible...but she never knows anything! </p>

<p>I am going insane. She isn't helping with the quizes and she prevents me from studying before them!!!!!! She has turned from a good friend to my arch enemy because of this. </p>

<p>What should I do?</p>

2

<p>when you can't find a way, you make one.</p>

3

<p>group quizzes are a recipe for disaster, in my opinion... they defeat the ostensible purpose (as a metric for the teacher to see what students are confused about and how students are progressing) and they cause all sorts of trouble between friends. if it's possible to do discreetly, I'd try asking your teacher if the groups could be randomly reassigned once or twice a quarter; there are plenty of good educational justifications for this, beyond the personal reasons. good luck.</p>

4

<p>"but I take my friend to school, and she is always late! I sit outside of her house for 20 minutes (calling her the entire time) while she takes her sweet time eating breakfast, and I sit there starving in the car. "
Tell your friend well in advance that you will pick her up at XXX time, and if she's not ready, you'll have to go on to school without her because you need to talk to the teacher about the quiz. Let your friend know that your grades are at risk, and if your friend wants you to drive her, she'll have to be ready on time.</p>

<p>Here's an "I statement" that you can use, "It makes me upset when you are late when I pick you up because then I am not able to ask the teacher important questions about the math quiz. For that reason, I will no longer be able to wait if you aren't ready at the time we agreed on."</p>

<p>Your "friend" is being very inconsiderate. You are doing her a favor. If she's not on time, you have every right to continue on to school without her. If she complains, too bad. She's the one being selfish.</p>

<p>"This is especially irritating when it is a quiz or test day, and I wake up early to ask the teacher questions. Sometimes we have vocab stuff about math on the quizes, so I tell her to study that as much as possible...but she never knows anything!"</p>

<p>Clearly, you can't depend on your friend or the other person, so you need to do whatever you can to get high grades on those quizzes even if it means getting a tutor. If that also means your friend and the other person get high grades, so what? Anyway, if you end up carrying them, they'll end up flunking the tests since presumably the tests aren't taken in groups.</p>

<p>" while she takes her sweet time eating breakfast, and I sit there starving in the car. "</p>

<p>That sounds like you're making yourself into a martyr. Get up early enough to eat. How can you do well on a quiz if you're starving? Why would you make time for your so-called friend to eat when you didn't even take the time yourself to eat?</p>

<p>If you truly don't have time to eat, then take something with you that you can eat along the way.</p>

<p>Take charge of your destiny. You aren't powerless in all of this.</p>

5

<p>I love group tests. We had several in Pre-calc. He put us in groups though and he put one smart person and 2-3 less smart people in each group. However, even with slackers, they may remember one or two things you forgot.</p>

6

<p>Northstarmom gives such good advice.</p>

<p>Do not wait for your "friend". Tell her once this weekend that this is how things will work from now on, starting on Monday:</p>

<hr>

<p>You will arrive at whatever time, say 7:15 a.m., HAVING ALREADY HAD YOUR BREAKFAST, and you will leave at 7:16 a.m., with or without her.</p>

<hr>

<p>Do not: </p>

<p>argue with her
call her
beep the horn more than once
beg her
get irritated with her
lose your temper
steam in silence
explain yourself more than once, briefly</p>

<p>Just simply and calmly leave. </p>

<p>You are doing both yourself and her a great disservice to do otherwise.</p>

7

<p>dont take this the wrong way, but you are already insane</p>

8

<p>groups quizzes? ***?</p>

9

<p>Dont think skipping trig is a good idea. Dunno in your school, but trig and heavy in our calculus classes.</p>

10

<p>If you had to skip either trig or precalc, skip precalc. Skipping Trigonometry is not a good idea if you want to succeed in calculus.</p>

<p>Precalculus is pretty important as well, but a good Alg. 2 foundation could make up for that.</p>

11

<p>i didnt take trig and im doing groovy in calc. but it's ab.</p>

12

<p>trig is precalc</p>