Improving math skills

[Oz67]

I am doing early math in Khan Academy, I am trying to improve the severe feature of Dyscalculia, I don't know if I will be able to go to complex math in the future, but I will try my best. Sometimes, I felt like cutting math, but that is not a healthy mindset. I failed early math most of the school years, and at some point felt like quitting, but I started to try again.

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

I thought I had dyscalcula, then, at the age of 40 I discovered Statistics and Statistical Design of Experiments. I found that I understood uncertainty and the math made sense.

 

[Ronald Zeeman]

Everybody has their strengths. I never liked languages, must admit I was good at both math and languages. interpreting what a certain piece means drives me nuts. just give me the rules, Not interested in what the writer meant. Probably why I never listen to music lyrics.

 

[Slime_Punk]

Ooo, this one hits close to home!

All throughout school, I sucked at math, never saw any use in any of it, and basically thought it was just something that weird people did on the weekends or something (pardon my previously narrow world-view, I was (and still am) a bit of an idiot!).

Fast-forward many years, and I found myself learning to code and actually having to work through some of these lessons I've disregarded throughout the years; the very language that we've built (or discovered, which is highly debatable) in order to observe and understand the universe was right at my fingertips (Math, not specifically code).

Anyway, have you ever tried learning some basic skills like this? I find that it's such a useful environment to test out math problems, physics, probability and so much more. Plus, Python is super easy to learn (even kids do it!).

 

[Shevek]

I learn math by trying a problem with single-digit numbers, so I can see easily if it makes sense, doing it two different ways. I got hung up for quite a while on the notion of squared numbers because nobody thought to use the example of estimating tile for a square floor. I always prefer a real-world problem of some interest to me than just number juggling. Once I am confident in a formula I plug in the real numbers to get the answer I need.
There's two parts to math - the logic, and the calculating. The calculating has gotten very easy, so it is easy to focus on the logic. Still, it gets tedious, so I found that the fun way was to take my notes in BASIC, so I can just plug in numbers for what I'm doing instead of looking up stuff.

 

[Progster]

I tried Khan Academy just for fun a few years ago, but couldn't do complex algebra and gave up on it. The problem was not understanding what I was doing wrong, or why the answer was wrong. At school I was good at geometry, but couldn't do the more advanced algebra questions.

 

[Oz67]

Ooo, this one hits close to home!

All throughout school, I sucked at math, never saw any use in any of it, and basically thought it was just something that weird people did on the weekends or something (pardon my previously narrow world-view, I was (and still am) a bit of an idiot!).

Fast-forward many years, and I found myself learning to code and actually having to work through some of these lessons I've disregarded throughout the years; the very language that we've built (or discovered, which is highly debatable) in order to observe and understand the universe was right at my fingertips (Math, not specifically code).

Anyway, have you ever tried learning some basic skills like this? I find that it's such a useful environment to test out math problems, physics, probability and so much more. Plus, Python is super easy to learn (even kids do it!).

I am learning math from scratch.

 

[Ronald Zeeman]

I learn math by trying a problem with single-digit numbers, so I can see easily if it makes sense, doing it two different ways. I got hung up for quite a while on the notion of squared numbers because nobody thought to use the example of estimating tile for a square floor. I always prefer a real-world problem of some interest to me than just number juggling. Once I am confident in a formula I plug in the real numbers to get the answer I need.
There's two parts to math - the logic, and the calculating. The calculating has gotten very easy, so it is easy to focus on the logic. Still, it gets tedious, so I found that the fun way was to take my notes in BASIC, so I can just plug in numbers for what I'm doing instead of looking up stuff.

My issue with math was the memorizing.

 

[Oz67]

My issue with math was the memorizing.

Me too.

 

[Ronald Zeeman]

I tried Khan Academy just for fun a few years ago, but couldn't do complex algebra and gave up on it. The problem was not understanding what I was doing wrong, or why the answer was wrong. At school I was good at geometry, but couldn't do the more advanced algebra questions.

what they don't tell you every branch of math is like a different language with slightly different grammatical rules
logic is the only commonality. Incidentally boy did Kurt Godel skew with the mathematicians.

 

[Oz67]

what they don't tell you every branch of math is like a different language with slightly different grammatical rules
logic is the only commonality. Incidentally boy did Kurt Godel skew with the mathematicians.

That makes sense.

 

[Outdated]

I am learning math from scratch.

One of the ways a lot of children have their maths lessons reinforced is by playing games that require them to do simple maths in the head for the sake of scoring.

One that instantly comes to mind is a dice game called Zilch. Most dart board games and many card games also encourage you to improve this skill.

 

[Ronald Zeeman]

unfortunately, I never play games even as a child. Could have become a good euchre player if I remember what was played, I just can't bother, silly game.

 

[Oz67]

I pass early math, but with a little bit of trials errors, it's a bit frustrating though.