[HN Gopher] Don't force your kids to do math
___________________________________________________________________
Don't force your kids to do math
Author : happycats
Score : 223 points
Date : 2025-04-19 18:08 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (blog.avocados.ovh)
(TXT) w3m dump (blog.avocados.ovh)
| ogogmad wrote:
| Maybe find an application of the subject that they might find
| interesting. I suppose if you can't find anything that interests
| them, then it's much harder to teach it.
|
| For instance, perspective drawing might provide a nice
| application of 3D projective space, its subspaces, and
| perspectivities between those subspaces. Some of the theory of
| conic sections might be relevant too.
|
| Computer graphics provides a nice application of coordinate
| geometry. This covers elementary algebra, Pythagoras's theorem,
| etc.
|
| Even eating pizza can provide an application of differential
| geometry.
| jvanderbot wrote:
| I tell my kids they can have letter cookies if they pick a word
| that starts with the letter, and can have 5 treats if they ask
| for 4 but know what "plus one means" or can have 4 if they
| recite "2 plus 2 equals ... ".
|
| They're 3, so I don't expect that to scale, but I'm hoping it's
| normal reward-for-knowledge by the time we get report cards.
| CBLT wrote:
| Something that might work for getting your kids interested in
| modular arithmetic: The Chicken McNugget Theorem.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| When I was having trouble learning multiplication my father made
| up a payment system. He made flash cards and I got a payment for
| every one I mastered (I had to get it right some number of times,
| not just once). I ended up with maybe $25 or $50 which was a lot
| for a kid in the 1970s.
| Rendello wrote:
| My mother tried to give me $5 for every book of the Bible I
| read. I never took her up on it even though I knew about the
| basically freebies like Jude. I wasn't opposed to it, but it
| felt like -on the one hand- I didn't want to half-ass it and
| read a few books -and on the other- I really didn't want to
| read the entire Bible. So I guess that a completionist attitude
| prevented me from getting $30!
| helph67 wrote:
| Perhaps make them aware how important it is with examples from
| nature?
| https://duckduckgo.com/?t=lm&q=fibonacci+in+nature+examples&...
| jvanderbot wrote:
| Kids do not understand the concept of "importance". At least no
| kid I've met. That part of their brain doesn't work. They'll
| trade effort for privileges or toys tho, and are little mimicry
| machines so they follow you if you use it.
| jerkstate wrote:
| yeah, I recoiled when the author of the post says "no
| bribing" - bribery is one of the most useful tools a parent
| has. I guess you could call it "incentive" or something, but
| really, it's quid pro quo.
| jvanderbot wrote:
| Honestly it's so close to how the world works I can't
| believe 1. Avoiding loss of privilege and 2. Gaining new
| things as reward isn't the top two parenting tips.
|
| But probably zeroth, most important, is modelling good
| behavior. Kids are mirrors.
| kaashif wrote:
| You can definitely make things better or worse for kids
| by choosing the rewards you give them.
|
| My parents would reward me by letting me pick out a book
| at the book store. I'd be excited the whole week.
|
| I may feel differently about reading it I had been forced
| to read and rewarded with something else, like junk food.
| jvanderbot wrote:
| We are torn but decided to keep books scarce, and scold
| them a little bit when they sneak books into bed. We know
| but they are much more likely to get their rebellion out
| reading now. Which I love.
| jerkstate wrote:
| We went the other way and have plentiful books, constant
| library trips etc. but have had to regulate sleep by
| setting a regular lights out time. Executive function and
| mood really suffers when sleep is insufficient.
|
| I appreciate the idea of harnessing rebellion and I'll
| think more on how to apply that to my parenting :)
| al_borland wrote:
| Something occurring in nature doesn't necessarily make it
| important to their lives.
| codemac wrote:
| It's not about forcing your kids to "do math", but to excel at
| important skills far before the benefits of being good at that
| skill matter.
|
| The amount of homework/study per day that maximizes math scores
| on tests is significant, 1+ hours/school day by the time they're
| in middle school, with it helping even more for those who are
| starting out poor at math[0]. You'll note the referenced study
| doesn't even max out progress for any group - meaning most could
| have studied more and improved more.
|
| I don't know any kids that voluntarily did an hour or more of
| solely math study per day. I know plenty that were forced, and
| ended up loving math or other technical fields as adults.
|
| As a parent of young kids, obviously I haven't gone through high
| school yet - but I don't think many children who reach their
| potential in math, english, music etc will have no pressure from
| their parents.
|
| [0]: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8025066/
| Der_Einzige wrote:
| Me being forced to do tons of horrible math by my abusive
| grandfather at a young age for literally 4+ hours at a time
| gave me a few things.
|
| 1. A true hatred of work, make work, and a strong desire to
| defend laziness as a concept (note that Bertrand Russel agrees
| hard with me here!) -https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Praise_
| of_Idleness_and_Ot...
|
| 2. A love of subversives and cheating the system. Basically,
| the guys writing leetcode cheating software are saints in my
| book. All subversions of the attempt to turn society into a
| meritocracy (a term which was originally supposed to be a
| slur/negative connotation -
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_of_the_Meritocracy) is
| extremely good.
|
| 3. An advanced knowledge of TI basic, so I could cheat hard on
| every single school assignment I could get away with. AP
| Chemistry? I've got a symbolic stoichometry solver app!
| Calculus? CAS system in the palm of my hand!
|
| Play stupid games with children, win stupid prizes. Maybe don't
| force them to work like little slaves in their early life, and
| they won't strike back at your society systems.
| ogogmad wrote:
| Raising kids is hard. Sad. And what do I know about it?
| Regardless, parents do need to get involved in their
| children's education. For instance, they should help their
| children prepare for entry exams into secondary school. This
| shouldn't take their child 4 hours a day. Maybe 10 minutes on
| some days, and 1 hour on others.
| matthewaveryusa wrote:
| I had similar conclusions, but the other way around:
| absolutely no guidance. Fortunately by the time I programmed
| and sold the basic ti math exam solvers to by classmates for
| 2 euros a pop I had everything memorized.
|
| Nothing like cheating the system to know the system
| CivBase wrote:
| Your experience sounds awful but surely there is a reasonable
| middle ground between forcing a kid to do _any_ math and
| forcing them to do it in 4+ hour sessions.
| frogpelt wrote:
| Maybe it wasn't the math, but the abuse.
| Hojojo wrote:
| You realize your experience can't be generalized to anybody
| else except for those who were abused in the same way you
| were? It also isn't what people in these comments are
| suggesting should be done.
| trinix912 wrote:
| > As a parent of young kids, obviously I haven't gone through
| high school yet - but I don't think many children who reach
| their potential in math, english, music etc will have no
| pressure from their parents.
|
| Well it depends. I had no pressure from my parents to learn
| about programming but still got really good at it. Could I have
| gotten even better had I been pressured to "practice"? Perhaps.
| But then I also wouldn't like it for the reasons I do (I like
| making stuff, but not solving riddles) and it would feel like
| the dad sport situation.
|
| I also played the piano for 6 years, starting out because I
| liked it. My parents didn't suggest it, but a few years in they
| were pushing me to continue even when I didn't like it anymore.
| Finished the first level of music school (6 years where I live)
| and haven't touched it since. Just to clarify, they weren't
| using any directly abusive tactics to keep me going, but they
| did put a lot of pressure onto it.
|
| There's a lot of nuance to all of this and I don't completely
| disagree that we should occasionally pressure our kids to push
| their limits. What we often fail to acknowledge is that kids
| easily change their minds after a while. Just because they
| liked something at a certain point doesn't mean they still do.
| The easiest way to get a kid to dislike something is to make it
| a chore. Additionally, I think we need to ask ourselves whether
| it's more important to us to have a kid that's average scoring
| but has a (mostly) stress free upbringing, or one that excels
| but is stressed out by the time they hit high school. Kids
| absorb stress differently than we (adults) do.
| lanna wrote:
| I'm fortunate enough that my daughter has an admirable interest
| (and talent) for Math since very early age. She even won a medal
| at a renowned nationwide Math competition when she was in Grade
| 5... competing in the Grade 10 category.
| confidantlake wrote:
| That kid's name? Alberta Einstein.
| lanna wrote:
| The only thing better than telling a lie and people believing
| it, is telling the truth and no one believing it. Shows that
| her achievements are truly remarkable
| stuaxo wrote:
| My daughter and loads of kids watched number blocks from around
| two or three up, I think it made quite a big difference- she's
| far ahead of where I was now, years later.
| jerkstate wrote:
| ChatGPT makes it so easy to build a lesson/workbook for something
| your kid is interested in. I've used it to build workbooks on
| special relativity, tsolkovsky's rocket equation (including euler
| integration to build a scratch program), triangulation, logic
| gates, probabilities of simple dice games, etc. My pro-tip is to
| tell the LLM to format the document in LaTeX, so you get
| beautiful math typesetting.
|
| You don't even have to get through the workbook. Get to a part
| that they need to understand better and make a detailed workbook
| on that part (for example, triangulation -> solving a system of
| linear equations).
| le-mark wrote:
| Where can one learn more about this? I want to get some
| activities for my kids this summer...
| clove wrote:
| Me too.
| jerkstate wrote:
| I guess these workbooks usually come in two different
| "shapes" - one, a guided workbook with a high-level goal
| that combines several concepts, and another would be a
| practice worksheet where we do a bunch of exercise of the
| same algorithm (say, long division, calculating summations,
| or matrix multiplication) over and over. For the "workbook"
| pattern, we first discuss with the LLM the final goal (e.g.
| a scratch program that can calculate a rocket's position
| using the rocket equation). Then we flesh out the steps
| towards the goal - is it reasonable to add the math for air
| resistance? air resistance that decreases with altitude?
| gravity turn? how do we integrate the velocity and position
| for each frame? How can we relate the integration by step
| size to the underlying integral, by showing that the result
| gets more precise (but slower to calculate) the smaller
| your delta-t is? Then, produce a Scratch code sample that
| implements the velocity and position calculation. Of
| course, there are things subtly wrong with the code sample
| (usually, if the math formulas are well-known, they're
| correct), which requires debugging - just another type of
| problem-solving.
|
| The second shape, worksheets, is a lot more
| straightforward. Just define the type of problem you want
| to practice and have chatgpt make a bunch of problems. Then
| switch to one of the newer reasoning models and have it
| work the problems, and refine to get rid of any bogey
| problems (for example, for polynomial exercise, you could
| tell it to make sure the roots are integers)
|
| The worksheets are more "hands off" - I run them through
| the algorithm once and check their work once or twice and
| then let them do the rest. The important thing is that the
| worksheets are connected to their high-level goal, and they
| understand that in order to solve the big, hairy problem
| that they're interested in, they need to build up certain
| specific skills.
|
| Usually the worksheet goal is a pretty substantial
| conceptual stretch for my kids so they need to go through a
| series of fundamental worksheets. But the great thing about
| the LLM is, you can just tell it you're having a problem
| understanding some concept and to help build the
| scaffolding by listing all of the required skills to
| understand a concept, and picking the ones that needs
| improvement the most and practicing them.
|
| My approach draws a little from "The MathAcademy Way" -
| https://www.justinmath.com/files/the-math-academy-way.pdf
| but instead of building fundamentals evenly in all topics
| before advancing (like expanding a sphere), we look only at
| the scaffolding required to support some higher-level goal
| - it's sort of like the masters/PhD process but guided
| through existing human knowledge:
| https://www.openculture.com/2017/06/the-illustrated-guide-
| to... . As a side note, I think it's really fun to include
| the history (mathematicians who contributed to the ideas)
| as well as the notation (using the greek letters,
| explaining why it's common to use them). When the kids
| notice the names like Pythagoras, Newton, and Euler
| reappearing frequently, and get a sense of the time scale
| these discoveries happened on, they treat the current state
| - and their ability to go learn thousands of years of math
| in months - with more reverence.
| twodave wrote:
| Another article where someone thinks being a parent means they
| understand all children. I have 4 kids, and 2 of them definitely
| would never do math, even basic math, for fun, ever. Their brains
| lack whatever pathways most people utilize to learn math, so I
| now have a 15 year old who has to work nearly as hard at
| arithmetic as she did when she first learned it. No amount of
| drilling, change of curriculum, buckling down or backing off has
| had any impact. She has absolutely no interest in math. But the
| kid reads faster than I do, which is not slow at all.
|
| The only thing I know about kids after having adopted 4 of them
| is that none of them are alike. The only time when you can really
| train them to do anything consistently is when they are babies.
| As a result all 4 have great sleep habits :)
| diego898 wrote:
| Best advice I ever received is: You have to parent the kid you
| have - not the kid you want
| IG_Semmelweiss wrote:
| This 100%
| mattpallissard wrote:
| I have 5 and can say that this is the way.
| mathattack wrote:
| Yes. And it's the same when the kids come from the same parents
| too. We have one kid that's willing to go very deep on math.
| The only does what can be figured out in 3 seconds or less.
| Same genetic parents, same school system.
|
| The original concept in the article of exploration is great.
| Some kids want to explore math, some science, some music, and
| some Starcraft.
| -__---____-ZXyw wrote:
| Have you come across
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Teenage_Liberation_Handboo...
|
| I read it (as a non-child), and a lot of my certainties about
| what young brains are and are not capable of got joyfully
| exploded. I'm not linking it to you proscriptively, or with a
| specific suggestion or riposte in mind whatsoever - you just
| might be interested in it.
|
| School is very successful at convincing kids (and former kids)
| of two things: firstly, that the academic subjects they purport
| to teach are actually delineated by the school textbooks and
| curricula. And secondly, that the reaction people have to
| specific subjects within these school structures are the actual
| unchangeable nature of the person's relationship with the
| subject.
|
| I hope one day our societies move past these two egregious and
| immeasurably damaging beliefs.
| twodave wrote:
| I haven't read the book, but we have 100% had the "you don't
| have to graduate if you don't want to" talk with this one
| haha. She doesn't want to drop out, but definitely isn't
| interested in college. We want to keep that door open for her
| if we can, so we just remind her that staying in school
| requires doing some things she doesn't like.
|
| But yeah, at 15 it gets a little hairy. You have a kid who
| wants to be an adult, but in a lot of ways they are not
| prepared to make adult decisions still. Eventually she will
| have to make them, ready or not. But we have a few years left
| to help her, so the focus becomes how to best do that.
| Timwi wrote:
| > School is very successful at convincing kids (and former
| kids) of two things:
|
| Well, and thirdly, that your worth as a person is determined
| by your results in graded examinations, and by extension,
| your salary or some other numerical rating decided by someone
| else.
| -__---____-ZXyw wrote:
| Absolutely, I think that's the other huge one. Thanks for
| chiming in to complete the thought!
| PostOnce wrote:
| I as a child, a teen, and a young adult thought I hated math, I
| got bad grades and it bored me. I dropped out of school. I
| later went to college and took remedial algebra twice.
|
| Math in school was purposeless and rigid, a rote procedure to
| be followed by command because that's what kids have to do.
|
| Now, I have grown older, and my curiosity drove me to learn
| because I wanted to make things, machines and software and
| probabilistic strategies. Things that necessitate math. If you
| can't rotate a vector, your guy walks faster diagonally. If you
| can't think mathematically and you want to lift a 2 jointed
| robot arm that weighs several tons, you're going to tip it
| over, and possibly die in the process. You can do it without
| trig but you can't do it without thinking about math.
|
| Once I found purpose, I began to appreciate the beauty of the
| more elegant solutions. I kind of fell in love with math as an
| adult. Now I watch numberphile with my kids and make
| complicated machinery and software at work.
|
| I think a lot more people love math than realize it, because
| they're conflating math itself and what school calls math,
| which is worksheets and demands, not beauty and creation.
| necovek wrote:
| With my kid in elementary school, I can see how math
| instruction is generally terrible: teachers rarely have any
| enthusiasm for teaching it. I only had one great math teacher
| (combining enthusiasm, skill and hard work) and I've been
| through special math programs (in high school and uni).
|
| Again, it is a question of incentives: someone with
| enthusiasm for math would likely go with a higher paying job
| requiring higher level math.
|
| Still, despite the crappy teachers, I was better than most to
| persevere at it until high school where I had the great
| teacher.
|
| But this does not scale and we are losing kids to bad
| teachers: how can we fix this?
| bn-l wrote:
| > The only time when you can really train them to do anything
| consistently is when they are babies.
|
| This is really stupid.
| twodave wrote:
| If you can't recognize a little tongue-in-cheek humor then
| maybe you're the stupid one ;)
| smath wrote:
| About a year ago I came across the concept of 'math circles',
| here on HN. It was this longish but very interesting article:
| https://www.thepsmiths.com/p/review-math-from-three-to-seven...
|
| The key element here is nurturing curiosity. Since then i and my
| 10yr old have been sitting through a virtual math circle led by
| Aylean McDonald on parallel.org.uk an organization run by Simon
| Singh
| r58lf wrote:
| For elementary school age kids, maybe even middle school, try
| getting them started with the app "Euclidea".
|
| They won't think of it as math. It's gamified geometric
| constructions. Starts simple, "how do you bisect an angle" with a
| compass and a straight edge. It goes to a very high level that
| will challenge anyone.
| add-sub-mul-div wrote:
| Something we don't pay enough attention to is that while
| calculators have solved everyday math to the point we downplay it
| as a required skill, people are not pulling out their calculator
| at the grocery store to make better purchase decisions, even
| though we all have one in our pocket now.
|
| So we handwave the importance of being able to do everyday math
| in our heads, while also not taking advantage of the tool that's
| a substitute for it. We're less educated but also less effective
| than we would be if we'd never invented automated calculation and
| were forced to be sharp about it.
|
| Is there a name for this phenomenon?
|
| And what's it going to look like a decade after AI has caused
| people to stop using their brain for general thinking like it's
| stopped them from doing math?
|
| (I'm sure you, the reader, are very good at math and are an
| exception to this still-apt generalization.)
| XorNot wrote:
| But the reality is that's usually almost a false trade - I'm
| not buying one item in the grocery store I'm buying easily a
| dozen or more. The best way to do this would be toss the online
| inventory into a solver to calculate "best value" for me, but
| in reality it would be a waste of time because if they're out
| of something, or the quality looks suspect, then that blows
| that calculation completely. And then am I going to do this for
| every single item, where every minute in the store is
| multiplying through the rest of my day? How much is the time
| shopping trading off against extremely sparse leisure time?
|
| And then there's intangibles - something being slightly cheaper
| doesn't necessarily mean I'm making a good trade off by buying
| it for my overall quality of life.
|
| In Australia at least this whole problem was perfectly
| adequately solved by mandating bulk price labeling on all items
| in the supermarket. Products in comparable categories have per
| volume/weight prices listed alongside item prices.
| trinix912 wrote:
| > In Australia at least this whole problem was perfectly
| adequately solved by mandating bulk price labeling on all
| items in the supermarket. Products in comparable categories
| have per volume/weight prices listed alongside item prices.
|
| Same in Europe. Mandatory labeling per volume/weight, pre-
| discount, after-VAT in addition to the discounted item
| prices. Then you glance at the shelves and make up your mind.
| j45 wrote:
| Learning to get to a best price per unit is a pretty useful
| skill that could make a lot of difference for a lot of future
| adults, just like financial literacy.
|
| Some things aren't optional, and if they are seen as such, it's
| going to force the child to learn later in life what they
| couldn't earlier on.
| jodoherty wrote:
| I think most people don't care about optimizing an extra $10
| out of their weekly grocery run.
|
| Probably a better example is figuring out the cost of a loan.
| Just multiply the amortized monthly payment by the term and
| compare that to the loan amount. If the difference makes you
| balk, then go ahead and walk.
|
| How many people even realize that loan interest is a
| significant cost and would bother to do that? Or know how to do
| that? Most people just try to minimize monthly payments to
| something they can bear and sign the paperwork.
| lordfrito wrote:
| > I think most people don't care about optimizing an extra
| $10 out of their weekly grocery run
|
| I remember when this kind of "optimization" was done
| regularly by a great many shoppers on budgets. Back in the
| day some stores even used to put calculators on the shopping
| carts.
|
| People used to know how to budget. Apparently the average
| American is affluent enough to not need to be able to do this
| any more. I worry that the atrophy of these kinds of
| practical skills will cause much pain for a great many people
| at some point down the road.
| jodoherty wrote:
| I worry too. American consumer credit card debt sounds like
| it's rising pretty quickly, and many people I talk to have
| a lack of free will and carry a sense of unfairness in the
| system they live in.
|
| However, people can also adapt pretty quickly.
|
| Those grocery shopping "optimization" skills are making a
| big come back (and have been since Covid). There are plenty
| of YouTube and TikTok videos popularizing how to get more
| out of their grocery hauls.
|
| Lots of people are also learning how to budget, how to
| invest, etc. and sharing their excitement about it too. For
| some folks, they finally learn this stuff in their 40s and
| 50s, but there are also a lot of young adults learning
| these skills thanks to the Internet.
|
| So I also have hope.
|
| I just don't think the lack of basic math and budgeting
| skills displayed by average consumers are a problem so much
| as a symptom.
| raymondgh wrote:
| 30 minutes of play per 3 days is such a brutal reality to
| acknowledge. One of the most wonderful experiences in all of life
| so drastically limited by the society we've constructed.
| twodave wrote:
| In some ways yes, but men have always been the ones to go
| hunt/farm for long hours and provide for the family, leaving
| the children home under the care of the mother/village for days
| or weeks at a time.
|
| I would go so far as to say modern society actually enables us
| to be more involved in our children's lives, especially those
| for whom remote work and home schooling are options.
| twodave wrote:
| To clarify, for those who seem not to have RTFA but are
| downvoting (I can only assume based on perceived sexism since
| nobody has been brave enough to comment)---the parent was
| quoting an article written by a working father, who said his
| internal KPI was, "If I haven't spent 30 minutes playing with
| my kids in the last 3 days something is wrong."
| Aurornis wrote:
| > One of the most wonderful experiences in all of life so
| drastically limited by the society we've constructed.
|
| I could understand if someone was forced to work two full-time
| jobs (as my grandfather was), but I find it much harder to
| blame 'society' when so many of these situations are self-
| imposed.
|
| It's possible that I'm jaded from hearing a subset of parents
| complain about not having enough time with their kids but then
| get stuck scrolling their phone while kids want to play. I also
| know some parents who insist on having a spotlessly clean house
| every day and then complain that there is enough time to spend
| with their kids.
|
| I've gravitated toward peer parents who have similar priorities
| in life which has indirectly made me happier. Seeing all of the
| parents in my friend circles prioritize spending time with
| their kids and being honest with themselves about their
| priorities has been unexpectedly helpful for my own sanity.
|
| Again, nothing against parents who are really forced to
| allocate time elsewhere, but I'm tired of seeing self-inflicted
| problems of prioritization and time management be externalized
| as blaming society.
| iFire wrote:
| Teach kids to do math by have them make mods for their favourite
| games.
| CommenterPerson wrote:
| Compare learning math to learning to bicycle. There is some some
| sweat and struggle that needs to be put in, before one "gets it".
| After this it can become enjoyable. I encouraged my daughter with
| practice exercises from a young age, but tried to avoid making it
| a drudge. She built up confidence and did well with it. She is
| also very hands on creative. She decided to study engineering and
| is working towards her PhD.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| Those aren't nearly comparable. Riding a bike is one simple
| skill and as long as you're not racing that's enough for most
| people. Meanwhile learning maths is a years-long effort at
| best. I learned how to ride a bike within an hour by myself
| when I finally had a good reason to learn it. I can't say the
| same about maths.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Bike is fabulous self-correcting vehicle in most operation
| conditions. The trick really is just to learn to trust it
| when it is moving. And then what to do when it stops.
|
| Math is layers upon layers upon layers. And then it also
| branches. Never really had willpower to learn it myself
| alone.
| imtringued wrote:
| Learning math is equivalent to learning to cycling if you had
| to learn cycling from scratch with every bicycle.
| IG_Semmelweiss wrote:
| Have them play a game like math maze 2!
|
| They will force themselves to play... and do math in the process.
| murkt wrote:
| Just spent 10 minutes playing it, looks pretty fun!
| hahamaster wrote:
| I tell my kid that math is a language. You learn to speak it,
| just like you learn to speak any other language, slowly, by
| listening, understanding, speaking, intuitively recognizing
| patterns, rules and exceptions. When you start to become fluent
| you translate problems into math and solve them. At school they
| keep trying to make them memorize useful phrases, like a tourist
| that goes to Paris and learns how to say "where's the bathroom",
| "hello", "would you like to sleep with me", "thank you",
| "goodbye", etc.
| chasely wrote:
| > and learns how to say "where's the bathroom", "hello", "would
| you like to sleep with me", "thank you", "goodbye"
|
| Quite a story condensed into those five phrases.
| sitkack wrote:
| For sale, condom, never worn
| pxeger1 wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Marmalade
| hilbert42 wrote:
| _" At school they keep trying to make them memorize useful
| phrases, like a tourist that goes to Paris...."_
|
| Like learning dozens of trig identities without any explanation
| about why one would need them. As I've mentioned elsewhere
| learning math for the sake of it isn't enough. For most of us
| math has to have relevance, and for that we have to link it to
| things in the real world.
| annerxox wrote:
| We can't even figure out that there are bottom up vs top down
| learners.
|
| Instead we will just continue to slog along with the same
| poor system. Math wise, completely at the expense of the top
| down learners.
| agnishom wrote:
| > math is a language
|
| I think there are some differences
|
| If you are a physicist or an economist, you may be using
| mathematics as a language in the sense that you are using a
| mathematical description to convey an understanding of the
| natural world or the economy to your colleagues. But if you are
| a mathematician, you are interested in the mathematical objects
| for their own sake.
|
| There is also a difference between the purpose of learning
| language and learning math. The goal of learning language is
| (often) to be fluent in it. In other words, the goal is to
| reach a level of proficiency which would allow you to not have
| to think about language and focus on the content of the
| conversation instead. On the other hand, the goal of learning
| mathematics is usually to be able to solve mathematical
| problems. Being able to do math without "thinking about it" is
| not usually a requirement.
| j45 wrote:
| Forcing is kind of hopeless. So is logic, and reasoning.
|
| How children learn (rely on the prefrontal cortex of their
| adults) is very different than how adults learn (no fully
| developed prefrontal cortex until 25-26), learning about this can
| help a lot.
|
| Learning more about the Reggio Emelia approach might help parents
| curious about this, it has been quite surprising how much is
| possible naturally. One of the best things to do is to
| relentlessly read to and with your kids.
|
| Also, linking a topic to their interest's radar, encouraging
| curiosity, play in general, and letting them potentially discover
| it can go a long away.
|
| When they've got something they want, teaching math and savings
| is a great thing. Understanding life is a lot harder without
| knowing a basic bit of math, and can be made a bit easier when
| doing it younger.
|
| I had a math teacher that once made it clear, some stuff can just
| click, others is just about doing a lot of examples to learn the
| patterns. Doing math is very different than being creative with
| being comfortable to find it.
|
| Today, I'd probably setup a good prompt to find a way for the
| child to share their mine to discover how they like to learn, and
| how they might like to learn faster and easier by taking some
| shortcuts through math directly or on navigating an
| ontology/taxonomy perspective.
| j45 wrote:
| Forcing is kind of hopeless. So is logic, and reasoning.
|
| How children learn (they can't rely on a fully formed prefrontal
| cortex like adults) is very different than how adults learn (no
| fully developed prefrontal cortex until 25-26), learning about
| this can help a lot.
|
| Learning more about the Reggio Emelia approach might help parents
| curious about this, it has been quite surprising how much is
| possible naturally. One of the best things to do is to
| relentlessly read to and with your kids.
|
| Showing kids the math in every day things, especially things they
| already love is a helpful way of making it approachable, or at
| least aware.
|
| Also, linking a topic to their interest's radar, encouraging
| curiosity, play in general, and letting them potentially discover
| it can go a long away.
|
| When they've got something they want, teaching math and savings
| is a great thing. Understanding life is a lot harder without
| knowing a basic bit of math, and can be made a bit easier when
| doing it younger.
|
| I had a math teacher that once made it clear, some stuff can just
| click, others is just about doing a lot of examples to learn the
| patterns. Doing math is very different than being creative with
| being comfortable to find it.
|
| Today, I'd probably setup a good prompt to find a way for the
| child to share their mine to discover how they like to learn, and
| how they might like to learn faster and easier by taking some
| shortcuts through math directly or on navigating an
| ontology/taxonomy perspective.
| fleshmonad wrote:
| When I was 8, I went to the library in our town a lot. My
| parents went there sometime to return their books. At some
| point I just stayed there when they would go home. First I was
| in the children/teenager section and soon in the general
| library, where I would read about programming and computers. I
| learned C by age of nine.
|
| The "undeveloped PFC" argument is shallow, unspecific and
| usually just used to infantilize younger people. It may be
| useful if the child is under 6 years old, but at the time
| someone is 17 or older, it becomes essentially useless.
|
| My learning process was always, and still is fueled by
| curiosity.
| Infiniti20 wrote:
| Surprised no one here has mentioned Kumon. Hated it but it works
| comment_anon wrote:
| I would agree. Kumon wasn't my son's favorite thing and he
| eventually decided/asked to stop. But the repetition and
| discipline of working at it every day had an influence. It
| didn't manifest until undergraduate but he ended up switching
| majors to math and is now pursuing a math PhD. Probably not
| common, but like learning to play the piano, I think it gave
| him a comfort with the basics and an intuition that allowed him
| to explore his own interests.
| asdf333 wrote:
| math circles are good for this. i'd suggest it if there is one
| nearby
| jamesy0ung wrote:
| As someone who just finished school, I'm trying to figure out how
| to get genuinely interested in mathematics. I've never been
| particularly strong at it, yet I'm planning to enter a university
| program that demands a high level of math. The problem is, it's
| hard to motivate myself to study math for its own sake. For
| example, I loved learning programming because it's hands-on--I
| can build something and immediately see the results. In everyday
| life, though, I rarely need more than basic arithmetic or simple
| sin/cos/tan trigonometry.
|
| How do you develop a lasting interest in math when it doesn't
| feel immediately useful?
| yablak wrote:
| Get a good teacher. They make it fun, or interesting.
| Avicebron wrote:
| I'm going to share my anecdote, because it may help, but
| everyone is different and your mileage may vary.
|
| I'm a MechE by classical training (professionally I actually
| work doing software/network stuff, don't ask, DNS (screams
| internally)), so here's where it stood out for me:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_analogy
|
| Internalize what this simple example represents, think about
| why that's mathematically interesting, and start looking for
| where it applies elsewhere. You too could be roped into doing
| systems engineering at scales you didn't think people haven't
| already figured out.
| jodoherty wrote:
| One of my undergrad degrees is in math. As you study it, you
| learn to identify your assumptions (axioms), find or build
| interesting abstractions, prove properties about them
| (theorems), and then map all sorts of other things into those
| abstractions by figuring out that they're really the same
| thing. It's even more interesting when you start to find things
| that are different or question things you always took for
| granted.
|
| Math gives you the ability to leverage the very structure and
| relationships of pure abstraction. It's quite the super power.
|
| None of the specific things you learn studying math will be
| nearly as useful as the ability to think mathematically.
| Escapado wrote:
| N=1 datapoint here. I studied physics in university and before
| I started I was not aware that physics is basically just math
| where the results sometimes relate to reality. The pure math
| courses I took were the most difficult and in the beginning I
| loathed them, because it felt so unattainable to get any
| intuition, let alone real proper comprehension for all the
| concepts they threw at us. For a long time I felt like I was
| just hanging on by threads and especially if I compared myself
| to those who had some innate interest in math or generally some
| really good intuition on the abstract concepts (or even prior
| knowledge) it was really demotivating. But I also felt like I
| had no choice but to continue and as time went on the I grew
| fond of it. And the feeling of being overwhelmed changed - that
| is to say I still was completely lost every time a new topic
| was breached and I could not understand even half of the proofs
| in class - but I did not feel so defeated about it. And I grew
| to like the feeling of actually completing the work sheets they
| gave us every week. The process of solving them was often
| excruciating but if you did the sense of accomplishment is
| real. I think for most people higher math is really difficult
| and that is part of why it is interesting. Another aspect I had
| to accept over time is that even though you can state a
| mathematical fact or conjecture in just a hand full of symbols
| or a plain sentence it does not mean that truly understand it,
| its implications or how you got there can be understood the
| same way that other prose can be. Sometimes you have to stare
| at, contemplate and scribble around one equation for days until
| you understand whats up.
|
| If there was any advice I would give, then it's probably
| similar advice on how to stop procrastinating on anything that
| is difficult. Establish a routine first - find a spot that you
| will only use for studying this (like a spot in a library),
| start small, divide and conquer, accept that you will not
| understand most things easily, reward yourself for the small
| wins along the way, find an accountability partner or someone
| to study with if that's your thing, make a regular schedule
| with regular times where this is what you do - consistency is
| key, even if its just for 5 minutes, stack it onto other
| habits, see yourself as a scholar of math - it is what you do,
| lean into the discomfort, as enduring that is a valuable skill
| in itself.
| anta40 wrote:
| Perhaps think of them as solving logical puzzles. It's fun.
| Even though not always related to everyday tasks.
|
| For me, it began many years ago when reading about Hilbert's
| hotel paradox. Turns out our laymen's understanding about
| infinity isn't as really refined.
|
| I write mobile apps for living and indeed these stuffs are
| irrelevant for my work.
| Qem wrote:
| Probability/Statistics is a good excuse to learn mathematics,
| because paying a little attention one finds lots of day-to-day
| situations where is possible to apply it. For example, see the
| secretary problem[1].
|
| [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secretary_problem
| notesinthefield wrote:
| I wish I couldve excluded everything past basic algebra and
| hopped right to statistics at a young age - I *loved*
| everything about the practicality of it, how it explained
| tangible relationships and illuminated the world. Algebra and
| calculus were so un-engaging I had those teachers calling me
| everything but a stupid child.
| bisby wrote:
| Have you ever watched a video of a highly skilled tetris
| player? Where they fill the screen most of the way to the top
| and then suddenly they just combo the whole thing down and
| everything wraps up cleanly, and then they start fresh.
|
| The feeling of "oh yeah, that was nice watching that mess turn
| into something clean and squared away" is where I get a lot of
| my joy from math.
|
| But also, there are uses to math that you might be able to play
| with through every day, but you've never thought of those
| scenarios in a mathematical way.
|
| I was walking today, and on the street there is a right angle
| turn. The inner portion of the turn is just a square right
| angle, but the outside of the turn is a radius. I started
| wondering to myself, if I want to be on the outside of the turn
| going into and exiting the turn, what would be different ways I
| could walk this, and what would the distance differences be.
|
| Crossing directly across, to the inner corner and crossing
| directly across to the outer side again, would be 2w (for the
| width of the road w). Following the edge of the radius would
| (assuming perfectly circular), be 1/4 of a circle, so 1/4 _2_
| pi _w = 1 /2 _ pi * w. The shortest route is a straight line,
| which would make a right triangle, so w^2 + w^2 = c^2, 2w^2 =
| c^2, sqrt(2) w = c
|
| So crossing twice is 2w, following the edge is 1/2 _pi_ w, and
| shortest path is sqrt(2)*w. Not super applicable, and I didn't
| need to do math to figure it out, but I was walking and bored,
| so I found joy in it. The fact that they all boil down to
| having w as a factor means I could figure out a nice ratio
| between all of them. And then I needed to mentally figure out
| what 1/2 pi was. 3.14/2 = 1.57... And I know that sqrt(2) is
| roughly 1.41 ish.
|
| So now I know that crossing twice has a cost of 2, following
| the edge is 1.57, and direct line is 1.41. Following the edge
| is vaguely close enough to the ideal path to warrant not
| walking into the street to optimize the route, 1.57 / 1.41 is
| about ~110%. Whereas by defintion, a cost of 2 is going to be
| sqrt(2) times sqrt(2), so ~141% more than shortest path.
|
| A few things to note here. First off, I'm aware that not
| everyone finds the same joy in doing simple mental math and
| thinking about problems mathematically even when there is no
| need to do it, but trying to think of things more minor trivial
| things mathematically may cause you to at least appreciate it
| more, which can grow into joy. And second, I wasn't doing any
| complicated math in my head. I just thought to myself "is it
| faster to cut to the inside corner and then cut back out... of
| course not, right?" and I was able to answer that definitively
| to myself. Did it matter? Was the answer probably obvious
| anyway? Probably, but I was able to _prove_ that. And I value
| facts. Finding joy in the simple things lets you build up more
| of a familiarity and view it more as a problem solving tool
| than a tedious thing to rote memorize.
|
| A great way to build up math familiarity and see how other
| people find joy in mathematics would be to watch Numberphile
| videos on YouTube[0]. It's a bunch of mathematicians sharing
| things they find interesting about math. Some times are REAL
| hard to grasp, but some are just very interesting puzzles[1].
| The puzzles don't always have clear immediate usefulness, but
| can often be described as "a mathematician wanted to know an
| answer, so they did some math to find out and prove something
| to themself."
|
| Sorry, end of spiel.
|
| tl;dr - find the joy in the simple things and use math as a
| tool to answer (even simple) questions to help highlight the
| usefulness.
|
| 0: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoxcjq-8xIDTYp3uz647V5A 1:
| https://youtu.be/ONdgXYEBihA
| commandersaki wrote:
| Find math that interests you!
|
| I didn't particularly find (at the time) calculus,
| multivariable calculus, physics, etc. interesting as I didn't
| find the applications interesting at the time. I find these
| subjects representative of what you traditionally learn at
| school.
|
| When I entered uni I discovered my passion for discrete math,
| algebra (groups, rings, fields, etc.), number theory,
| cryptography, theory of computation, etc. as they have a lot of
| application in CS.
|
| That's really what did it for me - and also I had great uni
| lecturers. I wish they would have taught the subjects I like in
| highschool - the difficulty level is about the same.
| jakelazaroff wrote:
| Make it practical! Graphics programming involves linear
| algebra. Databases involve relational algebra. Machine learning
| involves requires calculus. You'll naturally encounter hands-on
| tasks with tangible goals that involve learning new math.
| rizzaxc wrote:
| as someone who loved maths first but then do programming for a
| living, it's because solving puzzles is fun. I get the same
| dopamine hit whether it's a math problem, a coding task, or a
| video game level. but I think forcing yourself to like
| something is not the correct approach; you either like it
| naturally or you tolerate it for some other goals
| chrisweekly wrote:
| https://betterexplained.com might prove helpul?
| ludicrousdispla wrote:
| University is not a good place for learning mathematics as most
| of your math instructors there will be very good at math and
| very bad at teaching people that are not already very good at
| math.
| ziofill wrote:
| Sorry, no. Universities are great places to learn math.
| You're misrepresenting the genuine passion for teaching that
| many university instructors have.
| bawolff wrote:
| Except maybe not calculus. I remember my calc class kind of
| being terrible because it was a weed out for other majors.
| Every math class that wasnt required though was great.
| ludicrousdispla wrote:
| Sorry, no.
|
| For whatever reason, many University programs use high
| level math classes as a filter to weed out 1st year
| students from that program. If university instructors had a
| genuine passion, and ability, for teaching high level math
| then they wouldn't accept that as an outcome.
| ykonstant wrote:
| That is unfortunately true; not only in the US, but all
| around the world. The particulars do depend on the
| instructor, and many if not most instructors try to be
| motivational, but the syllabus is perfectly clear: "this
| is a weed out class". And when it comes to test time, the
| syllabus wins.
|
| The only thing I disagree with in your comment is about
| the instructors: they want to be employed, and they have
| to accept the syllabus and testing standards. It is not
| about passion and ability to teach (most, especially
| younger ones, are full of those); it is about meeting the
| departmental requirements.
| konfekt wrote:
| Haigh's Mathematics in Everyday Life [0] provides modern
| examples.
|
| [0] https://plus.maths.org/content/john-haigh
| bawolff wrote:
| > For example, I loved learning programming because it's hands-
| on--I can build something and immediately see the results. In
| everyday life, though, I rarely need more than basic arithmetic
| or simple sin/cos/tan trigonometry.
|
| Consider doing something that actually needs it. You like
| computer programming - consider making a game engine. It might
| be easier to learn when you can actually see that it is useful.
|
| Keep in mind though that math is a lot of things. People obsess
| over calculus but that is just one type. Math is just as much
| the different types of symmetry in wall paper patterns as it is
| finding the derrivative. Don't be afraid to try different
| areas. If you dont know where to start, consider picking up "A
| Concise Introduction to Pure Mathematics" by liebeck which
| introduces a bunch of different math concepts and see if any
| feel more interesting to you.
| procaryote wrote:
| If you love programming, there's quite a lot of programming
| where math is vital. Graphics, optimisation problems,
| cryptography, neural networks, figuring out if a hash works,
| projecting if an algorithm will scale...
|
| The tricky bit is often that you need to learn some of the math
| before you can see how it's useful, but if you need stronger
| motivation, you might try diving into a slightly math heavy
| programming problem and learn the math as you go
| lordnacho wrote:
| Don't study it for usefulness, study it for beauty. Look for
| amazing insights.
|
| Yes, you need some practical math as well. I did engineering,
| there's a lot of inelegant stuff there.
|
| But that stuff actually tends to be right next to some very
| interesting things.
|
| Here are three things you can find out.
|
| First, there's more than one kind of infinity. You can't make a
| map from natural numbers like 1, 2, 3 etc to real numbers like
| e, 0.632268, sqrt(2) etc. Look for Cantor diagonalization.
|
| Second, a random walk like a heads vs tails comes back to zero
| almost certainly. It also does so in two dimensions, like
| walking randomly in Manhattan. In three dimensions, it does
| not, and so for higher dimensions. Look for Polya.
|
| Third. There is a way for you and me to communicate secretly,
| despite everyone in HN being able to see our entire exchange.
| Look for Diffie Helmann.
|
| These days, there's a whole industry of people doing math
| videos with interesting stuff.
| crq-yml wrote:
| It's easier to appreciate math when you are disinterested in
| the results or applications, because the nature of academic
| topics near the core grouping of math/philosophy/empiricism is
| that they are discovered with a lot of meandering at first, and
| then sometime down the line they become _repurposed_ into a
| direct application that can be learned by rote. School tends to
| instruct in some of the most directly applicable stuff first -
| the "three R"s" plus some civics and training aligned with
| national goals. And that means that school predominantly
| teaches associations between math and rote methods, to the
| disgruntlement of many mathematicians. The "meandering" part is
| left to self-selected professionals, so it doesn't get explored
| to much depth.
|
| So I think a good motive for math study is really in games and
| puzzles, where the questions posed aren't about win/lose or
| right/wrong, but about exploring the scenario further and
| clarifying the constraints or finding an interesting new
| framing. Martin Gardner wrote a long-running column and a few
| books in this vein which are still highly regarded decades
| later.
| WalterBright wrote:
| > Without realizing it, he was doing algebra.
|
| A friend of mine taught remedial math at UW to incoming freshmen.
| She would write: x + 2 = 5
|
| on the blackboard and ask a student "what is the value of x?" The
| student would see the x, and immediately respond with x means
| algebra, algebra is hard, I cannot do algebra.
|
| So she started writing: _ + 2 = 5
|
| and ask the student to fill in the blank. "Oh, it's 3!"
| zmgsabst wrote:
| I've always found that an indictment of math education -- and
| spent many, many hours discussing it.
|
| When teaching addition, workbooks commonly use a box, eg, "[ ]
| + 2 = 5" -- and first graders have no conceptual problem with
| this. Somehow, we lose people by the time we're trying to
| formalize the same concept in algebra. There's been many times
| I've written a box around letters in a problem and asked
| students "what's in the box labeled x?"
|
| Pedagogy is hard.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| Go from "[ ] + 2 = 5" to writing it "box + 2 = 5--what is
| box?". Then "b + 2 = 5--what is b?" then "x + 2 = 5--what is
| x?".
| sublinear wrote:
| I agree. I think the actual problem is that the student is
| trying to comprehend what it means for anything to have
| mathematical value other than explicit numbers.
|
| Numbers and letters are taught together, but not as
| symbols. Letters are taught with sounds and numbers are
| taught with counting. The notion of a symbol isn't really
| emphasized much.
|
| I would explain it more like after
|
| [ ] + 2 = 5
|
| what happens if you need more than one box for a
| complicated problem? Teach the idea that saying box #3 is
| equivalent to assigning an arbitrary letter for whatever
| reason you want, but that people more familiar with math
| prefer letters because they stand in for words that
| describe what the number is for. You might want to use 'c'
| for the number of cats you're trying to figure out.
|
| In a room of five animals two are dogs. How many cats?
|
| a = 5, c = ?, d = 2
|
| a = c + d
|
| so... 5 = c + 2
|
| what is c?
|
| Light bulb goes off: "You can do that?" Yes, you can do
| whatever you want and it's not all about carrying the one
| or whatever other rote teaching they've been given. They
| can get creative and be engaged, and then you let them know
| that actually there are some conventions people like to use
| for what they're trying to do. They might even believe
| they've invented a new idea. At least they're having fun.
| dr_kiszonka wrote:
| I agree with you.
|
| To me, a lot of pre-college math education could be
| summarized as "In this class I will show you a bunch of
| abstract problems, a bunch of ways to solve them, and I
| will test if you have learned them." Learning in these
| classes is often limited to memorizing a sequence of
| steps.
|
| That's why I would frequently ask "You can do that?"
| myself when talking to those whom I considered
| mathematically gifted (math olympiad winners and such). I
| think they realized that as a problem-solving tool math
| could be used creatively. I saw it as a largely useless
| hammer that to work had to be held in a very specific
| way.
|
| I remember connecting sets in, I think, Pascal to what I
| had learned in school and realizing that all that math
| was perhaps not as useless as I had thought : - )
| Jensson wrote:
| That is what math books already do.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| Some of them do it better than others.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| Basically, don't teach the _new concept_ and the _new
| syntax_ both at the same time. New things should be
| introduced one by one.
| uwagar wrote:
| back when we was new in programming it was similarly
| difficult to grok
|
| X = X + 1
|
| once we got it, it was a like new world!
| 5- wrote:
| most likely this very unfortunate misnomer started with
| fortran, where it was deemed lucrative to point out "how
| much programs look like mathematic formulas!".
|
| not only is this overloading a symbol (equality) with a
| completely different meaning (assignment), it is also a
| poor choice typographically, as it represents a directional
| operation with a directionless symbol.
|
| using an arrow for assignment is much better.
|
| it's also worth pointing out that unlike most others, logic
| programming languages (e.g. prolog) have actual variables,
| not references to mutable or immutable memory cells.
| uwagar wrote:
| arrow for assignment is cool, but the backspace key is
| the only closest arrow-like key on the keyboard but it
| has a different purpose. plus the arrow key should be
| laid out such that u dont have to press a SHIFT/CTRL/ALT
| to produce it.
|
| for this reason, i felt C a breath of fresh air cos u
| could just assign using = instead of what we was doing in
| pascal which was the horrible := where u had to press
| SHIFT for the :
|
| things like this matter.
| dr_kiszonka wrote:
| Right. If we went more in the direction of APL, we would
| have had way more symbols.
|
| https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/94/APL-
| keyb...
| sublinear wrote:
| The semantic meaning of a blank is much better understood to
| everyone than an arbitrary letter like 'x'.
|
| People just want to know why it's x and not something else or
| how a letter can have value. They might even think how can 24 +
| 2 = 5? They just want something to grab onto and nobody is
| really teaching the concept of a symbol in a math class.
| GodelNumbering wrote:
| thank Descartes
| ckolkey wrote:
| I thank, therefore I am...
| raverbashing wrote:
| > nobody is really teaching the concept of a symbol in a math
| class.
|
| This was what? 5th grade?
|
| What kind of crap teachers never taught that
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > What kind of crap teachers never taught that
|
| It's rarely the fault of the teachers.
|
| The problem is, in many MANY MANY schools, teachers are
| more like social workers that have to compensate for utter
| horrifics outside of school. You got a ton of children so
| poor they didn't have breakfast which means their first
| (and all too often: _only_ ) meal will be the school-
| provided lunch (Covid showed that - a bunch of schools were
| open at least for lunches). You got children that are
| literally homeless and living with their parents in some
| car on a Walmart parking lot. You got children whose
| parents are in and out of jail. You got children living
| with their siblings in way too small, pest and mold ridden
| "apartments". You got children whose parents don't have
| money to pay for basic school supplies. You got children
| who are dealing with mental, physical and sexual abuse. You
| got children where the parents are constantly on drugs or
| seeking for drugs. You got children with a drug dependency
| on their own - if they're lucky it's just tobacco or weed,
| if not it's opioids. You got children with parents or
| siblings with serious mental or physical health issues. Or
| you got children with their own mental and physical health
| issues, or if you want it worse, children with these issues
| but without access to any kind of treatment. You got
| children that are being weaponized in nasty divorces. You
| got children that are being weaponized by street gangs. You
| got children committing crimes from petty theft to dealing
| drugs just to survive. You got children that have to
| _literally work_ (and states like FL pushing to have _more_
| working children). You got children having their own
| children already (either from sexual abuse, from under-
| education about their own bodies, or intentionally because
| they fell for some stupid challenge /dare). You got
| children dealing with bullying, you got some who actually
| are bullies because they have no other way of dealing with
| their emotions or getting lunch money. You got children
| with parents with about zero interest in them. You got
| children who worry that they'll come home and find out
| their parents got snatched and disappeared by ICE. You got
| children who worry that ICE will storm their classroom and
| deport them. You got children who worry they might not
| survive the school day because someone will shoot at them.
| You got children who are constantly on the move because
| their parents' employment/deployment requires absolute
| mobility. You got children who are LGBT and have to deal
| with ever increasing hate against them (and LGBT youth
| already had significantly higher suicide rates than before
| the GQP made it a culture war issue).
|
| The US doesn't have any kind of system to help these
| children but schools and libraries, both are horribly
| underfunded (there's some school districts where teachers
| gotta take up second jobs because the government can only
| afford paying them for 4 days a week), and all too often
| teachers have to pay with their own money for students'
| school supplies.
|
| And on top of dealing with these kind of nightmares, they
| actually have to try and teach these children something -
| even if the children in question aren't anywhere near a
| headspace where they can actually learn.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| I taught at a nice middle-class school, so most of the
| problems you mention were not relevant there. And yet, it
| seemed like half of the kids' families were either
| recently divorced or in the process of divorce. I
| couldn't really blame those kids for not paying attention
| to school. And this seemed like the best case, so
| probably at most places it gets much worse.
|
| Education has a problem with scaling, especially at the
| elementary level. Sometimes people figure out a nice
| solution, but when you tell them "great, and now do this
| in every village" the problem becomes obvious. But there
| are kids in that village, too, and you want them to know
| reading and math and hopefully also something more.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > Education has a problem with scaling, especially at the
| elementary level.
|
| Not if you actually provide the money. Europe gets this
| down decently well - although I'll admit, in rural areas
| in Germany we got some serious consolidation issues
| thanks to urban flight.
|
| But at least our teachers are well paid government jobs
| and the job is decently attractive.
| vacuity wrote:
| There's plenty of money thrown at schools in the US, but
| the issue is that the students that live in poor
| socioeconomic conditions tend to not do well. The "simple
| answer" that addresses the root cause would make
| individuals not subject to poverty and whatnot. But
| throwing money at institutions is already on the ropes in
| the US, let alone throwing money at the "undeserving".
|
| (Yes, this is a political opinion. No, do not blame me
| for that. Politics does not come wrapped up neatly with a
| bow tie in a box. If you want to debate the veracity of
| my claim, go do that instead.)
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > If you want to debate the veracity of my claim, go do
| that instead.
|
| I'd do no such thing because you are completely correct -
| the only thing I'd add is that poverty, while being very
| dominant, isn't the only issue that desperately needs to
| be fixed.
| somenameforme wrote:
| This becomes even more true in higher level maths where
| programming language style functions would make everything
| vastly more clear, and easily typeable, than the traditional
| Greek symbols. sum(x+3, 1, 4) is just so much more clear (and
| consistent when generalized across other operations) and
| practically as concise as the mathematical way of expressing
| that which I cannot even type. Multiple variables would be a
| bit dirtier, but still much cleaner than the formal
| expression.
|
| Interestingly mathematical symbols in the past also regularly
| evolved. Then at some point we just stopped doing that and
| get stuck in a time which is arguably no longer especially
| appropriate. So we're left with rather inconsistent symbols,
| oft reused in different contexts, and optimized for written
| communication.
| QuadmasterXLII wrote:
| The formal language of math is intensely optimized for
| rapidly communicating with yourself 90 seconds in the
| future, when doing a proof or calculation, turning paper
| into working memory. It does seem silly to use the same
| language for communicating with others across unkniwn but
| deep chasms of context. Its remarkable that it works at all
| lazystar wrote:
| its silly. itd be like introducing first year programming
| students to advanced maps/filters/anonymous function
| syntax, instead of the easier to understand for loops and
| if/else statements. math's "no true scottsman" approach
| to teaching only hurts itself in the long run.
| jpc0 wrote:
| I'm not sure if it would be easier to explain a map /
| filter to a first year student vs implementing the patten
| manually using a for loop and if statement...
|
| Seems like a pretty easy example to make practically, for
| map have a collection of things, say balls or black. Pick
| up each one and do a thing to them, paint them blue for
| example.
|
| For filter do the same except have two different colour
| balls, if they are yellow they get thrown away, of they
| are blue they get put in a bucket.
|
| A for loop doing exactly the same you would need to
| explain the topic at hand, as well as explain iterating
| an index etc...
| renerick wrote:
| Explaining loops is independent of the concepts of
| collections though. It's also more general, since
| map/filter/reduce use some kind of loops under the hood
| anyway, the fact that probably shouldn't be ignored in
| education process. Unless of course you go with pure
| functional recursive iterator, but good luck explaining
| that one.
|
| Maps and filters also require understanding of higher
| order functions and the very idea of passing function
| around as a value. I would argue that implementing
| map/filter with a loop and then demonstrating how this
| pattern is generalized as .map()/.filter() functions is
| better and more accessible
| imtringued wrote:
| The strangest part about mathematics culture is that
| there is a culture of vibing the notation.
|
| Nobody in school ever tells you that there are glossaries
| on Wikipedia that tell you the meaning of the symbols.
| You're supposed to figure it out yourself using vibes.
|
| The way mathematic notation is taught is inherently
| unstructured. You're expected to just get it.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| For the purposes of education, it is important to keep in
| mind that "optimized for performance of a highly trained
| person" and "optimized for understanding of a complete
| beginner" are two different things.
|
| I often see people make the mistake of trying to teach
| inappropriately abstract things to small children,
| because that's what the pros do, and we want the little
| kids become pros as soon as possible. Problem is, trying
| to skip the fundamentals is only harmful in long term.
|
| First kids need to learn what all that stuff _means_ ,
| and then we can proceed to teach them the shortcuts.
| pipes wrote:
| Thanks for this comment. My secret shame as a programmer is
| that I haven't really learnt much maths, stopped at 16 in
| school. Writing out the sum function like you did makes
| perfect sense to me immediately.
|
| What I should really do is create myself a cheat sheet of
| symbols to code...
| imtringued wrote:
| Just read this:
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_mathematical_
| sym...
| pipes wrote:
| Thanks for this :)
| renerick wrote:
| It's hard to debate that mathematical notation has a lot of
| room for improvement. High level algebra is very cryptic
| and often looks like an arcane incantation rather than
| something comprehensible for an unknowing person.
|
| That said, as a person who moderately enjoyed math in high
| school and university, this functional notation would make
| me hate math infinitely more. It's would look like Lisp,
| which, at high level, looks just as cryptic as algebra. The
| sheer amount of braces and mistakes that would be made when
| reading and writing them is nauseating.
|
| Infix notation, for all its flaws, provides important
| visual aid for understanding the structure of the
| expression (the sum of two fractions looks very different
| from fraction of two sums for example). Whereas with
| functional notation it's like working on linear textual
| representation of abstract syntax tree. Trust me, nobody
| wants to read, write or transform one by hand
| milesrout wrote:
| The notation as it is works very well. It looks
| unfamiliar to you because you aren't familiar with it.
| cardanome wrote:
| Might I introduce you to our lord and saviour APL? Infix
| notation and was originally created to be exactly that, a
| better math notation.
|
| https://aplwiki.com/wiki/Comparison_with_traditional_math
| ema...
| hilbert42 wrote:
| APL >>>> Linear A (Well almost!)
|
| ;-)
| serbuvlad wrote:
| My first thought when I read sum(x+3, 1, 4) was x+3+1+4.
|
| Also it should be sum(x+3, x, 1, 4) since you need to
| encode what the iterator variable is as well.
| maccard wrote:
| I don't recall the exact age, but when I was doing math in
| primary school (somewhere around age 9/10) we were absolutely
| using symbols - "Paul has two apples, and the basket can hold
| 10 apples. How many more apples can Paul put in the basket"
| is the same as 2 + x = 10
|
| We did these sorts of problems for a long time, with
| addition/multiplication/fractions, and even when we started
| doing actual algebra the problems were introduced the same
| way "let's look at a problem we've solved already, and write
| it in a different way".
| HdS84 wrote:
| I will die on the hill that most of math would benefit from
| better naming, less short names and longer format. Yes, the
| crack math guys have no problems with terse symbols. But most
| people do. Good example is Greek letters for geometry. They
| are not really taught in school so an easy formula gets
| 'weird squiggly thing times another squiggly thing....' and
| that does not help understanding at all
| ndriscoll wrote:
| For any given problem, you usually know what it is your
| studying, so writing out names doesn't have much benefit.
| On the other hand, a more visual language (which is what
| mathematical writing is) lets you easily look at specific
| portions of the picture and read off how it behaves, which
| _is_ very useful. Basically, getting hung up on names means
| you 're reading it wrong.
| globular-toast wrote:
| This is like trying to change English or arguing that we
| should all speak Esperanto. Mathematical notation isn't the
| way it is to save ink or make it look difficult. It's that
| way because it works. Notation isn't set by committee, it's
| just a way of communication that works. If you read cutting
| edge research you'll find notations being invented all over
| the place. Most of them will never go anywhere, some will
| become standard in their field (like big-O) and others will
| become universally used (like dropping the multiplication
| symbol and using epsilon for a small number).
| amluto wrote:
| One answer: sometimes you need a name, especially because
| there's more than one of them. Suppose you're looking for one
| digit numbers like this: 10*_ + _ = 73
|
| Now try saying the answer: "7 and 3". This gets vague quite
| quickly --- which blank is 7 and which is 3?
| carabiner wrote:
| Reminds me of how the S symbol in math is just a for-loop.
| RobinL wrote:
| There is a game called dragonbox algebra which I'm currently
| working through with my son and is an absolutely fantastic
| approach to this problem. Sadly its now part of a horrendous
| subscription service and is hard to access. I find it really
| sad that we've had computers for decades and there are so few
| good maths games like this.
| sethammons wrote:
| My kids all lived dragonbox games; the algebra and geometry
| one
| sethammons wrote:
| edit: loved*
| ozgrakkurt wrote:
| There are two sides to this. The system or method might be bad
| but also a determined person can go all the way and perform at
| a decent level if they put in enough time.
|
| Even if the system was better the person still has to be able
| to motivate themselves and put in the time.
| jand wrote:
| As we are sharing anecdotes:
|
| One of my school math teacher had the same approach in another
| way: We were expected to use greek letters, not latin ones.
|
| Same reasoning: It showed us kiddos that the letter was
| insignificant compared to the concept expressed by the letter.
|
| So my take would be: Your friend taught the students for the
| first time what they were actually doing while handling
| equations with "a letter in it". That is no problem of algebra
| in itself. It just means their previous teachers sucked.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| I saw a textbook that used a picture of a box in the
| equation. The number is hidden in the box, and you are
| supposed to figure out which number it is.
| danenania wrote:
| I got my daughter (just turned 6) this little hand held math
| game for her birthday: https://www.amazon.com/your-
| orders/pop?ref=ppx_yo2dv_mob_b_p...
|
| She loves it. It uses a '?' for basic algebra style problems
| and after a few days of playing (if/when she wants to, we don't
| make her play it), she was already much better and faster at
| those problems. It made me think that schools should be giving
| kids games like these.
| dr_kiszonka wrote:
| Is this the game? You linked to your order history.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Educational-Insights-Math-
| Electronic-...
| danenania wrote:
| Oops, yes that's the one.
| eimrine wrote:
| Is there any knowledge that is recommended to be forced to kids?
| j_bum wrote:
| Probably safety behaviors, e.g,, "let's look both ways before
| we cross the street, regardless of whether you want to"
| murkt wrote:
| If you formulate the warnings just right, you wouldn't need
| to "force" it, as kids will be willing to look both sides
| themselves. They like to be alive.
| grepLeigh wrote:
| I adored this post right up until:
|
| > I have an internal KPI: if in the last three days I haven't
| spent at least 30 minutes playing with my kid, there's something
| seriously wrong
|
| I think I'm interpreting this ungenerously, because my knee-jerk
| reaction was to wonder about who is handling the other 12+ waking
| hours a day.
| sdrothrock wrote:
| I read this as remembering to set aside time specifically for
| play and not just for day-to-day parenting and discipline
| jewelry wrote:
| And then your kids and their same generation would be replaced by
| their peer kids from hard working boys and girls from India and
| China. Unfortunately curiosity only works with brilliant minds.
| Normal minds plus curiosity is useless.
| teberl wrote:
| > Repetition is key
|
| Even with a "normal" mind. Train consistently to gain
| excellence!
| brianpan wrote:
| I think the advice is good for younger children. The author is
| using 14+11 as an example. Very engaged parents can have a
| tendency to overdo it, so it's probably a good reminder.
|
| As kids get older, they need to learn how to struggle and
| overcome struggles. (I would still caution against "forcing"
| math.) But yes, you need to start engaging hard work and
| determination.
|
| Btw, the two are not mutually exclusive. Young children should
| be praised for struggling at things so they begin learning that
| skill, too.
| riffraff wrote:
| Related to what the article mentions, about playing cards, I
| tried to get my kids into doing basic arithmetic by playing
| "scopa"[0] with them.
|
| Turns out, the one who didn't like math didn't like the game
| either, and the one who did like math liked the game too.
|
| So I'm not totally convinced you can just "trick" kids into
| liking maths, tho for sure it's a way to get them to exercise.
|
| [0] Scopa: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scopa
| zkmon wrote:
| > Kids are born explorers. They naturally want to discover new
| things, including math.
|
| That's true only until their senses are not shut off and
| attention is not fixated on screens. Exploration happens only
| when you have unused attention, sensory capabilities and need for
| a bit of hard work and risk-taking. Curiosity is less of a
| biological feature. It is a product of the need and the available
| resources (senses etc). All of these are missing now.
|
| There is no need or motivation. And there are no available
| resources (senses, attention). There is no justification for
| exploration and hard thinking.
| somenameforme wrote:
| Oddly enough I found a great 'trick' for this. Kids hate doing
| math tests, but turn it into a competition and game and suddenly
| they love it. Print out a bunch of remedial problems, perhaps 50.
| And then give them 1 or 2 minutes to do as many as they can. It's
| just a contest to improve against your own scores over time, with
| prizes for the kids who score the highest after a month or
| whatever.
|
| It's still literally just a math test/quiz, but somehow the
| context changes everything and even kids who really aren't into
| math were loving it, and also improving rapidly because the
| repetition helps instill intuition.
| greggsy wrote:
| There's a fine line between chores and games.
|
| Imagine having to move a round thing around some other people
| to get that thing into a square frame. Then, imagine that you
| can only use your feet!
| procaryote wrote:
| clever!
|
| I imagine the part of a test people dislike is failing, and the
| consequences from failing. Framing it as a game without those
| emotional stakes fixes that.
|
| If the teaching environment was set up to encourage learning
| rather than punish not having learnt yet we might not need
| these tricks, but that culture is slow to change
| laurent_du wrote:
| Very poor take. The author clearly has very limited experience
| with raising kids. Most kids won't do difficult things if you
| don't push them. Playing music, learning to spell correctly,
| doing mathematics, and so on. A very small minority of kids will
| do all of that easily and for the fun, but you can't rely on it.
| If you don't push your kid to do their 20 minutes of piano every
| day, they will half-ass it and will stop after 1 year and
| conclude they are not good at music. Same for sport. Same for
| reading books. Same for maths. And you know what? It's your
| fault. You chose to be lazy and complacent and didn't push them
| because it's hard to be a good parent. And now you expect me to
| validate your laziness? Nah.
| lukan wrote:
| Different point of view: do you consider hunting in the
| wilderness to be difficult?
|
| I do, it requires being still in miserable conditions for a
| long time, being cold, wet, mosquitos, and then usually still
| no success, but frustration.
|
| But to my knowledge, no savage kid is in need of being forced
| to learn it.
|
| "children sense your true passions and naturally want to join
| in"
|
| And that is my experience as well. But if you stop childrens
| curiosity out of limited time and patience "Be quite now!" -
| stop them from helping, because they are not a help in the
| beginning and you are faster on your own - then of course they
| won't just start enthusiastically some years later doing with
| motivation whatever it is, you define as their arbitary target
| now.
| jblecanard wrote:
| There is a huge difference between pushing your kids to
| overcome their current limits and forcing them to do
| something they do not enjoy at all.
| lukan wrote:
| There is indeed a difference between giving a slight push
| and "forcing" which is what TFA is talking about.
| guerrilla wrote:
| > But to my knowledge, no savage kid is in need of being
| forced to learn it
|
| Uhh then your knowledge is very limited because that is
| rather well documented. Also, why are you saying "savage"
| like an 18th century racist? Is that in fashion again?
| lukan wrote:
| Oh, I am obviously a racist, by glorifying indigineous
| teaching methods.
|
| But otherwise can you show, where this is documented? The
| natives tribes where I have some knowledge, don't force
| their kids to learn in the sense that is talked about here.
| No need to - the whole culture is about becoming a good
| hunter (for male individuals). So indeed lots of peer
| pressure, but no individual forcing.
| margalabargala wrote:
| > Oh, I am obviously a racist, by glorifying indigineous
| teaching methods.
|
| No, by calling people "savages", a pejorative, based on
| their ethnicity.
|
| Much like how it would be racist to call people
| "enslavers" based on their ethnicity, or "cotton pickers"
| based on their ethnicity.
| lukan wrote:
| Erm, english is not my first language, but I believe,
| savage stands for uncivilised person.
|
| So exactly what I wanted to talk about, when referencing
| "natural education".
|
| I did not talk about any ethnicity at all.
| gyomu wrote:
| Kids tend to want to partake of their own initiative in
| activities that are 1) physical, and 2) that they see adults
| themselves do.
|
| Hunting in wilderness is a good example; so are sports,
| cooking, crafts, etc.
|
| But unfortunately not all important activities that kids need
| to learn to become well adjusted adults in our modern
| societies fit those 2 criteria.
|
| Point 2) can be hacked to an extent by modeling the behavior
| yourself - eg kids who see adults read books are more likely
| to want to read themselves.
| t0bia_s wrote:
| Or staring to smartphone. Then, suddenly, we are surprised
| why our kids do same.
| seethedeaduu wrote:
| Oh yeah let's turn otherwise fun hobbies into a forced chore,
| that will surely be great for the kid. Forcing kids to learn to
| spell when they have learning difficulties (eg dyslexia)
| doesn't usually go well either it's just causing suffering for
| the kid.
| sssilver wrote:
| The problem is that it's extremely difficult for any activity
| like math, music, or drawing to compete with Minecraft and
| YouTube shorts.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| Kinda yes, but there are some solutions.
|
| I think the most important part is to start early. Make
| your kids interested in math, music, art, and sport, before
| they start school. Doesn't have to be anything
| sophisticated, simple addition and puzzles will do for
| math, etc. Then you have something you can later build on.
|
| There are also ways to make things funny, including math.
| Most people say that they hate math, but then they do
| Sudoku. So, try to make more math like this. Not all math
| can be transformed to funny puzzles, but after a few the
| kids will get positive associations with the subject, and
| will be more willing to learn more.
| cardanome wrote:
| The problem in this discussion is that people here seem to
| miss that both an excessively authoritarian parenting style
| is bad but also going full liberal and just letting them run
| wild is not the solution. Sometimes children need guidance an
| a gentle push.
|
| Even as a adult I sometimes need to get pushed. I sometimes
| take guided courses so I don't skip over the hard but
| important parts of learning a new thing.
|
| Just don't push your children too hard or you do more harm
| than good. Accept that they are not you and have different
| interests and needs. Like make them practice an instrument
| but give them a choice which one. And if after a few years
| they still hate it, well you tried. Maybe it is not for them.
| annerxox wrote:
| I think much can be learned from modern American kids
| sports vs the Soviet youth sports system.
|
| Kids specialize almost immediately now in a sport that is
| most likely because the parent likes that sport and wants
| the kid to be good at it.
|
| The Soviet system was the athlete as a kid should try as
| many different sports as possible until 12 or 13 because
| you don't know what the kid will have natural talent at for
| before then.
|
| That is not pushing the kid to practice something they hate
| but it is also not letting the kid be free to not do
| anything besides play on the phone.
|
| Kids ultimately like what they are good at. If I had a kid,
| I feel like my job would be to figure out what they have
| some talent at and then fan the flames so that talent turns
| into a passion. I think many parents though are trying to
| live out their own dreams through the kid, if the kid has
| talent for the activity or not.
| cpursley wrote:
| Doesn't seem to be an issue for Asian families or ones coming
| the from former Soviet block as well as Jewish ones. These
| groups as adults tend to outperform others. There's a reason
| for that: early childhood discipline and consistency being
| built into their cultures.
| sightbroke wrote:
| > Forcing kids to learn to spell when they have learning
| difficulties (eg dyslexia) doesn't usually go well either
| it's just causing suffering for the kid.
|
| I greatly valued the tutoring that I received for that
| (personally wish it had not been cut short). I was somewhat
| fortunate and received one-on-one tutoring in a secluded
| room.
|
| They provided me with clearer definition of rules (instead of
| sayings like "i before e...", proper phonetics, and a history
| of where English came from.
|
| That said, there's research into trying to determine which
| children with Dyslexia should receive specialized treatment
| as a segment just cannot learn to read at all.
| paganel wrote:
| The world needs less Asian kids being forced to play piano
| since a very early age and it needs more kids (Asian and not
| only) that are left to explore the world.
|
| Without that exploration the kids won't make the world _their_
| world, at best they 'd only make it a bad approximation of what
| we, our (older) generation, best think that that world should
| be.
| eastbound wrote:
| Any proof of why it is best?
|
| I prefer to live among educated people, thank you. I prefer
| my peers to go through forced history lessons, forced math
| lessons so they don't tank my government, and biology lessons
| so they don't tank the health system. Yes they won't be able
| to determine their gender, but that will give me grandkids,
| thank you very much.
|
| Same goes for piano or sports. Yes we need to pull people
| upwards, otherwise we'll all become fat americans.
| paganel wrote:
| Because "forced history lessons" doesn't help said kids
| understand what history really is about, it just helps them
| accumulate facts, if that.
|
| I'd say the same thing applies to math, where one can't
| really start understanding math until said kid is already
| an adolescent (unless they're a young Euler or something),
| so it always baffles me when I see parents filling their
| young kids with (fancy) arithmetics, most probably making
| said kids future therapy patients, all the while lauding
| themselves (the parents do, that is) that they're teaching
| their kids "maths".
|
| Related, one of the best maths teachers I've had (this was
| back in high-school, in the mid-90s) was very quick to
| point out that we should forget almost all "maths" we had
| learned in elementary school, and the he very soon started
| to explain to us the definition of the real numbers. Or
| maybe this is just an Eastern-European thing, who knows?
| Maybe further West they do confuse arithmetics with maths
| until the Uni' years.
| cpursley wrote:
| You've got it backwards: the future therapy patients are
| kids who are not taught discipline and persistence. Those
| who aren't struggle as adults as the real world is harsh
| on vibe based living. Also, all those "useless facts"
| eventually build up on each other. They are prerequisites
| of knowledge and mastery.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| You mention Eastern Europe, are you by chance familiar
| with the Hejny method of math education in Czechia?
| Because that introduces some "math beyond mere
| arithmetics" concepts to the elementary school education.
|
| Sometimes, it is possible to create a less abstract
| version of a more abstract thing, and thus introduce the
| seeds of the concept to children much younger. For
| example, "solve the equation 2x+1=7" is abstract, but
| "Peter decided to use a # symbol for a specific number,
| and he didn't tell us which one, but we found in his
| notes that # + # + 1 = 7; can you figure out which number
| is # ?" is simple to understand for a very young child,
| even if the child can only solve it by trial and error.
| creatonez wrote:
| > Yes they won't be able to determine their gender, but
| that will give me grandkids, thank you very much.
|
| All that praise for education and yet you've fallen for the
| tabloid-fueled conspiracy theory that transgender science
| is a hoax
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| What do you mean by "science" in this context? For
| example, both biology and anthropology are sciences, but
| biology can tell us that people evolved from apes, while
| anthropology can tell us that a specific tribe believes
| that they were created by a flying serpent. Both of them
| are sciences, both of them can talk about the same topic
| (the origin of humans), but they take a completely
| different perspective on the topic.
|
| Is the "transgender science" you talk about more like
| biology, i.e. describing how things _are_ , or more like
| anthropology, i.e. describing what some (sub)cultures
| _believe_? Those are not the same things.
| creatonez wrote:
| Biological _and_ cultural /historical. There is rather
| strong clinical evidence on the healthcare side of
| things, and an understanding of intersex biology
| (including how the the brain develops, not just the
| classically understood intersexes) shows a complex
| picture of where various components of gender may
| originate from on a biological level.
|
| But yes, much of what Foucault taught us about the
| arbitrariness of being a human in a culture does still
| ring true. No, it doesn't discount the hard evidence from
| biology and psychology.
| numpad0 wrote:
| I kind of get the both sides of the argument. It kinda
| feels wrong on one hand. Lots of people agree. The other
| hand, it kinda, just works. Great. Everyone's hit with
| down-trend TFR anyway so maybe not it.
|
| > at best they'd only make it a bad approximation of what
| we, our (older) generation, best think that that world
| should be.
|
| Also, this part in GP doesn't feel exactly right to me. The
| problem doesn't seem to be in education, but rather lack of
| systematic resistance in current systems of society against
| humans weaponizing the system as tools to hamper progress
| of humanity as means to win minor inner struggles which is
| stupid. But the world doesn't seem to be moving in a wrong
| direction, only slowly.
|
| Asian kids in 80s dreamed of bunches of permanent
| artificial space habitats running on fusion reactors. Still
| do. We've only gotten ground based fission reactors and
| space motor homes since then. But at least we are moving in
| that direction, just slower than at the ideal rate.
|
| China's just done a humanoid robot marathon event. The
| winner completed the race. They're definitely in the
| future. US is, in a state not in line with site guideline
| to describe. And the latter is supposed to be more correct
| state than the other? How is that possible?
| 05 wrote:
| Forced history lessons are just indoctrination and
| propaganda, since what you learn is dictated by the
| government. I wonder if there's a single country on Earth
| that teaches e.g. the history of Israel-Palestine conflict
| in a way that even tries to approach objectivity.
| vacuity wrote:
| All history lessons are indoctrination at the very least.
| There's not some "objective history book" where people
| can just learn "objective history" without zero doubts.
| Even for things that are taught more or less
| "objectively", no one alive has firsthand experience of
| them, unless they are recent. The end result of teaching
| critical thinking is that you shouldn't trust anyone
| completely, not yourself, and not your teachers. It's
| just that adding the layer of government propaganda makes
| things worse.
| milesrout wrote:
| Kids left to their own devices don't explore the world. They
| play video games and scroll on social media.
| ykonstant wrote:
| If that is the world you are providing, that is the world
| they will explore.
| dandanua wrote:
| It appears that no sane parents will allow their kids to
| extensively explore the world that the modern society is
| currently providing.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| It is not just me who "provides the world" to my
| children. Also their classmates, etc. And the internet:
| even when someone uses it to achieve a purpose, there are
| various ads and algorithms that try to turn you towards
| something else.
| djeastm wrote:
| Not if access to those things are limited while providing
| opportunities for other things that people enjoy.
|
| You don't replace enjoyable things with unenjoyable things
| and expect the child to become a well-adjusted adult. You
| give them alternative enjoyable things.
|
| Managing a child's burgeoning dopamine regulation system is
| a primary function of a parent. Abdicating that function
| for quick fixes is a form of neglect, in my opinion, just
| like feeding kids sugary cereals.
| theandrewbailey wrote:
| Any patch of woods seem to cast an irresistible call to
| explore on kids.
| cpursley wrote:
| Except they are now, wealthy Chinese are one of the most
| rapidly growing segment of tourists. Wanna guess what the
| wealthy successful ones learned as kids? That's right: piano
| and math.
| openplatypus wrote:
| > The author clearly has very limited experience with raising
| kids. Most kids won't do difficult things if you don't push
| them.
|
| Such a bold claim coming from some who does not share their
| credentials on the matter.
|
| My kid will do everything as long as it is interesting. My
| sample of 1 contradicts your claim, but neither of us are
| experts on the matter.
| Jensson wrote:
| > My kid will do everything as long as it is interesting
|
| Difficult things aren't interesting locally, you have to
| practice boring things in order to do interesting things in
| difficult subjects. Some kids do practice boring things if
| you just ask them, but most do not.
| Garlef wrote:
| I think you're very very wrong.
|
| Especially in maths, there's not much to practice.
|
| There's stuff to understand. And while this might be
| exhausting it's not boring and it's a very rewarding
| process in itself.
|
| Or programming... What's there to practice?
|
| Really. I'd like an example of something that's boring.
|
| My impression is that if you follow the path of discovery
| and applying things in context, there's nothing that's
| really boring.
| ohgr wrote:
| Sample size 3 here and they are all adults and all STEM
| grads.
|
| You have to push them, but push them right. That's a
| combination of coercion and encouragement and helping them
| avoid procrastination. There are hills to climb and they need
| helping over them to where the good stuff is.
|
| I remember my eldest crying over ratios at the dining table.
| Then algebra at the kitchen table. Then crying again at real
| analysis in the pub with me. She graduated with a first in
| the end.
| djeastm wrote:
| I'd be interested to hear what she has to say about the
| experience
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| If the kid isn't enjoying the piano lessons, will forcing them
| to do it for 20 minutes every day really be beneficial? Sure,
| they will now be able to do something - something that they
| absolutely hate... (also, why is it always piano that parents
| try to force on children?)
| milesrout wrote:
| They don't hate it. They dislike being bad at it, they
| dislike working hard at things, and they like video games and
| scrolling on their phones.
|
| And yes practicing will result in them getting better.
| ilt wrote:
| I think this is the crux. Nobody likes to fail, kids
| included. And their attention span is wonky too so they may
| not see much value in learning from failure/s since there
| are so many other attractive things asking for their
| attention and they would rather do them.
| cpursley wrote:
| Insane you're getting downvoted, this 100% and then some.
| There's a clear difference in outcomes between kids taught
| self-discipline and those who are raised standard Anglo-
| American ADHD style once they become adults.
| mrob wrote:
| The primary design goal for most traditional instruments
| was making them as loud as possible.
|
| I was briefly made to play violin as a child, and I
| definitely hated it (fortunately my parents recognized this
| and didn't push too hard). The reason is in retrospect
| obvious: violins are loud and piercing and played close to
| the ear. Nobody considered hearing protection back then. I
| learned recorder as an adult and the loud notes can exceed
| 100dB(A) measured at the ear (both alto and soprano
| recorders, and recorders have very limited dynamics).
| Violins seem to be at least as loud. I would hate to play
| without hearing protection no matter how skilled I become.
|
| Even in instruments where you can more easily play softly
| like a piano, the design for loudness can cause suffering.
| Pianos are much bigger than they need to be now that we
| have amplification, with correspondingly wide and finger-
| straining keys. Steel string guitars are louder than nylon
| but hurt more to play (and even nylon can hurt depending on
| your individual hand size and shape). I expect there are
| many children suffering hand/finger pain from being forced
| to play various instruments and genuinely hating it
| regardless of their skill level.
|
| When a child hates something, there's often a good reason
| for it that isn't obvious and that they don't have the
| communication skills to explain.
| milesrout wrote:
| You have the worst case of Dunning-Kruger syndrome I have
| ever come across.
|
| There are ages below which you are too young to play
| full-sized pianos, or play every interval an adult can
| play. That doesn't stop you playing it at all. What's
| more, your hands and fingers stretch. It isn't painful to
| play the piano.
|
| The stuff about loudness is just rubbish. There is
| absolutely no need for hearing protection while playing
| the recorder (a very quiet instrument), the violin or the
| piano solo. You have no idea what you are talking about.
| yongjik wrote:
| That's pretty funny, considering that it's pretty
| difficult for a violin novice to pull off a convincing
| fortissimo. Unlike piano, where you just have to smash
| the keys as hard as possible, you can't just mash your
| bow as hard as possible - you will probably get just some
| weak-ass screeching noise.
|
| In other words: what the hell are you talking about.
| blitzar wrote:
| > they will now be able to do something - something that they
| absolutely hate
|
| A valuable life skill if you want to ever have a job or get
| paid.
| Aeolun wrote:
| That's such a depressing way to see things. I'm sure most
| people do something they don't utterly despise, is only
| because they select for their local optimum.
| blitzar wrote:
| > I'm sure most people
|
| If you live in the bubble where you experience this,
| congratulation you live a wonderfully privileged life,
| never interact with anyone or are totally oblivious to
| the experiences of all the people you interact with on a
| daily basis.
| tasuki wrote:
| You're of course right, it's a privilege.
|
| But also, many people choose to do something they hate so
| they earn more money. They could be just as privileged
| and choose not to, just so they can compete with the
| Joneses and consume more...
| danenania wrote:
| So your parenting advice is to teach your kids to do
| things they hate while suppressing their feelings so they
| can be like the average unhappy person?
| zdragnar wrote:
| I hate doing laundry and cleaning dishes. I still do it,
| though.
|
| There are things in life that you won't enjoy but you
| need to do. Learning to do them anyway is in fact a life
| skill.
|
| I've seen people follow their dreams into careers they
| chose because they wanted them, despite those careers not
| being paid well. They're all at least as miserable as the
| average person, because what they enjoyed is now work,
| and they don't have money for anything they now enjoy.
|
| "Do whatever makes you happy" is a life plan for the
| financially independent. Most people simply don't have
| that luxury.
| blitzar wrote:
| Parenting, having and raising children, including but not
| limited to the act of giving birth is the ultimate
| example. There are many "piano lessons" along that
| journey.
|
| Sometimes you have to eat a shit sandwich.
| danenania wrote:
| Sure, but you don't have to accept that they're the only
| thing on the menu.
| blitzar wrote:
| Sure, you can take off at 2am and leave a screaming 2
| month old child in a room and never come back, because
| you have been trying for hours to stop it from crying and
| it is just too fucking hard - just like you can walk out
| of your piano lesson and never go back.
|
| Or you can reach for the sandwich.
| harvey9 wrote:
| Don't know about 'most' but I think many do exactly that
| in order to pay the bills.
| barry-cotter wrote:
| That sucks man. I hope things get better for you.
| blitzar wrote:
| The sweet is never as sweet without the sour.
| BeFlatXIII wrote:
| Similarly, it teaches the value of putting forth the
| minimum effort to appear to be doing the work. Putting
| forth more effort rewards one with more work.
| erxam wrote:
| I agree wholeheartedly.
|
| Honestly, I wish I had been taught that lesson early, so as
| to internalize it profoundly.
|
| Even with a lot of discipline and self-control, going
| through each and every day without mind-altering substances
| at hand is pretty dang difficult.
| tetris11 wrote:
| Yep, 6 years of being forced to play the violin.
|
| Sure, once I was playing it, I was fine, but I cannot explain
| to you the sheer dread I felt opening up the case.
|
| Have not played in decades, despite all those lessons and
| concerts and orchestra sessions.
| ctxc wrote:
| I felt the same. I didn't touch it for ~9 years.
|
| But I'm glad for it, since it lets me jam or enjoy myself
| without having to put the practice in now from scratch. I
| do it for fun.
| tetris11 wrote:
| I live in the hope that one day I will pick it up and
| feel nothing but contentment of being in the moment, but
| I'm just not ready for that yet.
|
| Even the smell of tree resin sometimes makes my stomach
| tighten with anxiety.
| zdragnar wrote:
| Executive function / demand avoidance. Not to the point of
| being pathological, but it is a learned emotional
| behavioral complex.
| ctxc wrote:
| "something they absolutely hate" is learning to read sheet
| music, training for skill, practicing for muscle memory.
|
| The fruits are reaped when they (me!) get older. Like I
| mentioned in another comment, I can play along to a song I
| like, play a song that is a certain memory, jam with friends
| at a whim.
|
| Those are not things I necessarily wanted to do when I was a
| kid. But the "forced" practice was required as a foundation
| to do what I want to today.
| djeastm wrote:
| > I can play along to a song I like, play a song that is a
| certain memory, jam with friends at a whim
|
| You can do any of those things without learning to read
| music. Ask me how I know
| sysrestartusr wrote:
| The important part is to start as early as possible and
| absolutely not trust the school/teacher or kindergarden staff.
| They are badly programmed to reinforce kids in what comes easy
| to them and stop encouraging them after less than a handful of
| attempts.
|
| If you have to restart later, no matter at which point, even up
| into 'the kids' 20s ( ultra late bloomers, slackers, kids
| disgusted by most people for reason Z, drug- or "condition
| X"-induced deadbeats, repressed kids with and without ADHD,
| failed or successful attempts by psycho-social environments )
| understand three things:
|
| 1) you are not pushing, even if you are, you are demanding sth
| for the sake of your child AND yourself. YOU WANT THIS first
| and foremost. It's not a bad thing, fuck what the little fucker
| wants.
|
| It's imperative for the kid to know that YOU WANT THIS no
| matter the obstacles. You want to see the process and result.
| It's a form of accountability, I guess. Kids pushing back is
| some dumb implicit way to check how important THEY and THE
| THING really are to you __or someone else_ (that counts for the
| ugly stuff, too)_. It 's part of our evolutionary, hard-coded
| OODA loop.
|
| 2) just start at the very beginning, so that it's easy, almost
| effortless. The kid will be annoyed on most of the difficulty
| increases, it always depends on the sub-topic so don't back
| down. Even 20 year olds will catch up with their successful
| piers within some time. Neuro-genesis is awesome. Most 'grown
| up' stuff is child's play and a matter of baseline-human
| character anyway.
|
| 3) your stress level is what matters. Stay cool, be equanimous,
| serene, check your posture, voice, tone, the discussion won't
| last 5 min and will be worth it.
|
| Absolutely force your kids to do math.
| kleene_op wrote:
| That was exactly my sentiment.
|
| My parents pushed me hard to do piano when I was around 10-12.
| After a year that went pretty well I was starting to get lazy
| and put very little work and investment into preparing for the
| next lesson. They still had me play piano a full year until
| they eventually gave up and bitterly told me what a waste my
| resignation felt to them.
|
| 20 years later, I got back to playing piano, and I can't thank
| my parent enough for having me to continue playing in my
| teenage years. Because it only took me a few month to be able
| to play pretty advanced piano sheets compared to some of my
| relatives who are struggling with the basics starting it in
| their adulthood.
|
| Same for maths. I feel that a lot of people like the author of
| this blog post are being extremely misdirected thinking math
| can and should be taught in a fun or amusing manner every time.
|
| Sure, a lot of topics in Maths can be made more digestible by
| "gameification" to help younglings develop an intuition. But a
| very big part of Maths actually requires you to sit down and
| painstakingly crunch down the numbers/equations, memorize and
| learn when to apply the correct methods to solve some problems.
| And even though this part can feel fun and engaging after a
| while, you can't expect children to exhibit such interest right
| of the bat without having them first struggle with the
| classics.
|
| Kids don't know better. Your role as a parent is to navigate
| along the fine line of forcing your kid to get good exposure to
| the (boring) activities we adults value and letting him enjoy
| what he enjoys. Only in doing that will your kid open up to the
| world and grow up into a functional human being.
| kstenerud wrote:
| My parents forced me to play piano, right up until I told
| them that I'll destroy our piano if they don't lay off, and
| any consequences they could think of would not stop me (I was
| normally an obedient child, but enough was enough).
|
| That got their attention.
|
| 30 years later I picked up classical guitar and loved it! Do
| I thank my parents for forcing the piano on me? Hell no.
| hilbert42 wrote:
| Your experience is the antithesis of mine, I wonder why
| people are so different.
| cpursley wrote:
| Like I commented in another post, piano gave you the
| foundation for learning classical guitar (and appreciating
| that genre of music). Very few guitar players can even
| recognize note names on a staff. You're not going to get
| far with classical guitar without it.
| danenania wrote:
| Unless you plan to be a professional musician, why does
| it matter if you "get far"? Isn't it supposed to be for
| fun?
| cpursley wrote:
| Because eventually you plateau without proper
| foundations, and that's not fun.
| danenania wrote:
| Does it matter if you "plateau" at a hobby? I have lots
| of hobbies and skills I've learned then plateaued at. It
| doesn't bother me in the least.
| cpursley wrote:
| Yes, it's been very frustrating because there's things
| (songs, techniques) that are beyond my reach at the
| moment due to large gaps.
| danenania wrote:
| I get that. It's satisfying to overcome those hurdles and
| frustrating to be blocked. Speaking for myself though, if
| I find I'm getting really frustrated by something that
| I'm supposedly doing for fun, it's a sign that I might
| not be approaching it in the best way psychologically.
| I'm usually much happier when I try to have more of a zen
| 'putting in the reps' mindset. Then the periods of
| progress are like icing on the cake, not something I
| _need_ to enjoy the thing.
| barry-cotter wrote:
| > Because eventually you plateau without proper
| foundations, and that's not fun.
|
| This is a completely alien perspective to most people.
| Most people never even really try to be good at anything.
| That you think this quirk of your own psychology is the
| norm shows a deep disconnect with the mass of mediocre
| people who don't care about being competitive because
| they're not trying to get highs up on some leaderboard.
| https://danluu.com/p95-skill/
| ctxc wrote:
| You need to "get far" enough for it to be fun.
|
| You want to have fun playing along to your favourite
| song. Or impromptu jam with a friend. Or sing for
| yourself because a song reminds you of a memory.
|
| They all have a minimum skill requirement, without which
| it isn't as enjoyable. You need to know to play
| reasonably well by ear to have fun imo.
| danenania wrote:
| Sure, those are definitely fun things to be able to do,
| but it's not some kind of essential life skill. If it's
| not someone's thing, why force it? There are plenty of
| other skills that are also fun to have.
| ctxc wrote:
| I mean, fair enough. I had an aptitude for it. If you're
| able to figure out what skills they might have fun with
| in the future, that's excellent. If not - I'm not sure,
| you gotta shoot your shot I guess? Because the dislike
| might be for the process (practice) when they actually
| would like the end product (jamming)
|
| I just had a kid so this is pretty real to me. How it
| will go is anybody's guess, but I hope it does go well :)
| danenania wrote:
| Congrats!!
|
| I guess I believe more in the Montessori idea that kids
| are intrinsically motivated to learn and excel, and they
| will tend to be naturally drawn to work hard at the
| skills that they are best suited for.
|
| I understand the idea that some skills have a hump to get
| over and it's good to encourage that determination, but
| I'd also guess that for every person like you who is glad
| they were pushed to learn some particular skill, there is
| another person who it affected very negatively. So I
| suppose it's a bit of a gamble in that sense.
| alabastervlog wrote:
| That was ironic understatement. With classical guitar,
| you won't really get anywhere without being able to read
| sheet music. It's not like rock and pop guitar where you
| can just learn tabs and slightly develop your ear and
| that's enough play along with all your favorite tunes.
|
| If you've already picked up reading music for one
| instrument, it's a ton easier for the next one.
| kstenerud wrote:
| It's not like learning to sight read is a "piano only"
| skill...
|
| In fact, I never actually learned to sight read until I
| started on guitar. All I remembered from the old days was
| "all cows eat grass"
| cpursley wrote:
| Learning sight reading is the most natural on piano like
| instruments. The notes are literally arranged in the same
| order. Stringed instruments are much more difficult to
| learn sight reading from scratch on.
| Magma7404 wrote:
| > piano gave you the foundation for learning classical
| guitar
|
| Absolutely not. If you hate something and don't learn
| anything more that entry level, it won't give you any
| foundation, only hatred and bitterness. Also the piano
| and the guitar are very different beasts that you cannot
| compare at all.
| toast0 wrote:
| The piano and the guitar are different in many ways, but
| they also have some similarities depending on how you
| play them.
|
| Mechanically, sure, nothing transfers. Rhythm transfers
| pretty well. An ear for what sounds right would too.
|
| If you're reading printed music, that transfers. A lot of
| guitar play comes from tabs though, which isn't really
| transferrable.
|
| If you play chords on the piano and the guitar, and
| especially if you're thinking about chord progressions,
| that transfers. But you might play either instrument
| without a lot of chords.
|
| Lead melody kinds of things can transfer a bit.
| Especially if you were thinking about how the notes in
| the melody fit with the chords, even if you didn't play
| the chords.
|
| Even if you didn't think you were learning music
| fundamentals, you might have picked up something.
| hilbert42 wrote:
| _" 20 years later, I got back to playing piano, and I can't
| thank my parent enough for having me to continue playing in
| my teenage years."_
|
| One of the tragedies of being young is that few have the
| insight to realize that the 'boring' stuff parents and
| teachers are forcing us to learn will actually benefit us and
| that eventually we'll be very thankful that they did.
|
| My parents nagged me all the time about studying and even
| though I did my fair share of it I never fully appreciated
| how important it was until much later.
|
| It's a strange phenomenon, one cognitively understands the
| reasons but one is isolated from the reality so one is
| somewhat distant from it. For example, one can get upset
| watching war footage on TV but being there is on another
| level altogether (soldiers often do not talk of their
| experiences because they know those at home will never fully
| understand).
|
| In the same way, wisdom gained through experience is almost
| impossible to impart to a younger generation who has no
| actual experience.
| ho_schi wrote:
| I upvoted all of the above posts because - all of them
| share some correct arguments. * Training is
| hard. * Using your training e.g. a bicycle race is
| fun. * Training is easier, if you actually know why
| you're doing it and recognize some progress.
| tasuki wrote:
| > One of the tragedies of being young is that few have the
| insight to realize that the 'boring' stuff parents and
| teachers are forcing us to learn will actually benefit us
| and that eventually we'll be very thankful that they did.
|
| I'm 40. I don't know, perhaps I'm still young.
|
| I did not appreciate having to learn the boring parts.
| Learning things for the next exam so as to forget them in
| two weeks... I didn't see the point then and still don't.
|
| I managed to get by with the minimum possible, fluked my CS
| education, then had a career earning an order of magnitude
| more than the average salary. Shrug.
|
| Maybe I'm missing something else because of my lack of
| education? I don't know...
| hilbert42 wrote:
| _" ...perhaps I'm still young."_
|
| Possibly so, wisdom often take years to gel and often
| only after life events force its notions to the fore.
| tasuki wrote:
| I had way more than usual share of "life events". I threw
| my career out the window to care for my toddler and dying
| partner. Then my partner died and I'm left alone raising
| the kid. What else is going to happen to make me wiser?
| throwaway31131 wrote:
| We're all going to have different paths but I'm certain
| that flunking CS education and then getting 10x the
| average salary is not going to be the common case and was
| probably only possible for a given point in time.
|
| I'm in my late 40s. I left grad school to get a job in
| VLSI because it was possible to do so in the job market
| of the 90s. In today's job market we wouldn't even pickup
| the resume of a new college graduate that didn't have at
| least a masters. I would've been totally passed by today.
|
| Assuming the benefit we're looking is getting a high
| paying job of course.
| ThrowawayR2 wrote:
| You (and I and many others on HN) were lucky enough to
| join the tech industry while it was still growing
| explosively and got outsized salaries because of it. If
| you were to do the same thing today, you'd be telling a
| very different and much grimmer tale.
| Magma7404 wrote:
| > the 'boring' stuff parents and teachers are forcing us to
| learn will actually benefit us
|
| My parents forced me to play the piano for more than 10
| years because they were obsessed with the piano, and
| because they had a piano. I hated every second of doing
| that in order to please them, and I never got higher than
| beginner level because it was a torture for me. Being a
| beginner for 10 years should be considered as abuse and it
| messed me up big time, especially for my daily confidence.
|
| 30 years later, I still hate that fucking thing and I
| understand that they fucked up due to their delusion. They
| deny everything when we talk about it though.
|
| Sometimes you have to listen to the kids and understand
| what they want do do, and accept it instead of feeding your
| Munchausen by proxy syndrome. All I wanted was a computer,
| even the cheapest computer ever would have been acceptable.
| Nowadays, I write C++ for a living and I still hate the
| piano. If only anyone listened to me back then... My hatred
| for that instrument is a mystery for some people, and some
| people think that "wisdom gained through experience is
| almost impossible."
| hilbert42 wrote:
| _" Sometimes you have to listen to the kids and
| understand what they want do do, and accept it instead of
| feeding your Munchausen by proxy syndrome."_
|
| I agree, and it's more than 'sometimes', kids have a
| right to be heard and that hearing should be fair and
| reasonable. Clearly, in your case it wasn't.
|
| What you experienced was unacceptable by any measure, and
| in my opinion the fact that your parents were oblivious
| to your predicament is a damning indictment on their
| parenting skills.
|
| Your extreme situation isn't what I was referring to, so
| let me explain by briefly describing what I experienced.
|
| I learned the piano because I wanted to, not because my
| parents forced me. In fact, whilst my parents were both
| musical we didn't have a piano when I was young--so I
| started late and that's been to my disadvantage. I
| mention that to let you know I understand what you went
| through.
|
| Whilst I like the piano learning it was no bed of roses
| and it's difficult for all but the most talented (anyone
| not wishing to learn it would be an unmitigated drag).
| For me, those fucking Czerny scales used to drive me to
| distraction, I'd goof off and play whatever took my fancy
| whenever I could. Also, my teacher used to reprimand me
| regularly for not reading score timings as written, I'd
| play the tempo as I felt felt like it and that always
| casued a ruckus.
|
| At no time did my parents force me to take subjects that
| I did not like. That said, gentle persuasion was used. I
| was never much good at languages and despite my
| ambivalence for the subject I took French not so much at
| my mother's insistence but rather her desire that I do so
| (her sister married a Frenchman and was living in France
| and she thought it would be useful). Learning French used
| to drive me crazy, it's not that I detested it (I
| understood its value), rather the problem was that I
| wasn't much good at the subject. I'd sit on my bed at
| home doing my French homework and bash my textbook up and
| down on the bedclothes whilst tying to learn those
| fucking French nouns with their damn random genders--why
| the fuck can't they all be 'la' or 'le' and not random?
| Having a single 'the' in English is immanently sensible.
|
| Well, despite being not much good at the subject in
| hindsight learning French turned out to be a blessing
| when I was living in Europe. I could never have foreseen
| that situation when I was at school.
|
| Another example, my father used to nag me about not
| taking Latin, my usual retort being why the hell would I
| want to learn a dead language (although that was more in
| jest at his persistence). I sort of had a paltry excuse
| as my school didn't teach Latin but there were
| arrangements to do certain subjects by correspondence
| under teacher supervision in the library. So I never took
| the subject at school, so nowadays my Latin is at best a
| mess.
|
| That was a fucking mistake of the first order on my part
| for reasons too long to describe here. It's only the
| wisdom of hindsight that I now know I should have taken
| my father's advice.
|
| BTW, I understand your frustration over not having access
| to a computer, I'm an IT professional and I managed an IT
| department for years (I was one of those nerds university
| security would regularly chuck out of the computer room
| at 10pm at night). If I'd been in your position, I'd have
| been mightily pissed off at your parents' miserable
| attitude.
| gizmondo wrote:
| > I can't thank my parent enough for having me to continue
| playing in my teenage years.
|
| Counter-example to anyone reading this and thinking about
| imposing this misery on their child - I absolutely hated
| piano lessons, and nowadays I absolutely hate that my parents
| forced me to do it. Total waste of time, even spending more
| time on Civilization or whatever instead would've been more
| valuable to me.
| wanderingbort wrote:
| I'm happy that there was overlap between what your parents
| put in front of you and what you found passion in later in
| life.
|
| I think that story happens to many but I cannot accept a
| premise that it is somehow universal.
|
| The passions I found later in life were unrelated to what my
| parents put in front of me. I suspect that it's because the
| activities I eventually found (distance running, volleyball,
| cooking) were not activities that my parents enjoyed or
| thought much about.
|
| Moreover, I was unable to develop healthy models of internal
| motivation until mid life. I didn't have to when the "why"
| was covered by my parents.
|
| Childhood should be the lowest risk time in life for people
| to learn to fail and find the path back to success. This is
| what I worry about as a parent when I try to set my kids up
| for future success. I want them to fail now.
|
| I see my role as a parent as coaching them to care about how
| they spend their time and how to recover from disappointment
| and failure. If they get that, then learning piano later in
| life is just work. They won't be afraid of that.
| apwell23 wrote:
| > "Because it only took me a few month to be able to play
| pretty advanced piano sheets compared to some of my relatives
| who are struggling with the basics starting it in their
| adulthood."
|
| I don't get it. you'll be a beginner in something that you
| weren't pushed to in your childhood. so what?
|
| are you planning to only do things you were pushed to as a
| child? I learnt skiing in mid 30s , never even saw snow as a
| child. Its my fav thing to do all winter and spent like 40
| days a season on snow. Not sure if i would've enjoyed it the
| same if i was "pushed" skiing as a child and hated it.
| maccard wrote:
| I don't have kids.
|
| The really important part of this is that kids mimic what they
| see adults they like and respect doing. If their role models
| spend 6+ hours in front of the television every night, that's
| what they'll do. If their role models are playing music or
| sport, that's what they'll want to do.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| Yes, but one of the problems with our civilization is that we
| typically do the important stuff out of our children's sight,
| and then come home tired and try to relax. So they do not
| naturally get a correct idea of what we do.
| tasuki wrote:
| Yes. Due to an unfortunate event, I'm a single father. My
| life improved dramatically when I started doing all the
| chores while the kid was awake:
|
| - We do the chores together.
|
| - Yes it takes ages, but I need to kill the time anyway.
|
| - Then she falls asleep and I can relax.
|
| This is literal heaven, compared to when I played with her
| the whole day and then did the chores when she slept...
| Aeolun wrote:
| So now you have a kid that's really good at playing piano but
| absolutely hates doing so. Mission accomplished?
| rerdavies wrote:
| The really important thing is to teach kids to find their joy.
|
| At the end of my second year of piano lessons, my teacher took
| me into her living room, and we listened to Glen Miller records
| for most of the hour. And then we had a cup of tea, and she
| told me, "this is the music that I love. I play piano because I
| love that music, and I want to be able to play it myself. What
| kind of music do you like?" I didn't really have an answer. So
| she told me that we should stop doing lessons, but once I found
| music that I loved, she'd be happy to teach me how to play it.
|
| In my early teens, I discovered Miles Davis. Once I had found
| my passion, all the hard work became play. I actually ended up
| learning to play jazz guitar, not piano. Even the heavy lifting
| was pure joy, because it had purpose and meaning.
|
| I didn't become great at mathematics until I discovered the joy
| in mathematics (another brilliant teacher handed me a stack of
| old math contests, and said here, you might find these fun. I
| placed 4th among 20,000 students).
|
| I didn't learn to write well until I discovered the joy in
| writings. (An absolutely brilliant English teacher who made us
| assign ourselves our own grades, but broke his promise in the
| end by upgrading all my papers to A+'s).
|
| And I gave my kids the room to find their joy as well.
| Loic wrote:
| But kids are going to have setbacks, they will reach a
| plateau in their craft (music, painting, art, sport, ...).
| You need also as a good parent to help your kids go through,
| to not give up, because even joy to do is not always enough.
| This is the hard part.
|
| From my modest experience of being a ski/snowboard instructor
| and trying to raise 3 boys (now 12, 16 and 18).
| bethekidyouwant wrote:
| why does a child need to break through a plateau at
| anything? Of my five sample size of five, expose them and
| support them, some things can't even hook you until your
| brain grows enough .. The musical one is in a band now the
| nerdy one likes inhaling solder. I did force both boys to
| Hockey but just to have passable skills so that he can
| enjoy that all that comes with the sport as an adult
| timcobb wrote:
| > why does a child need to break through a plateau at
| anything?
|
| Exactly! Why? The few things I do better than most people
| are things I've stayed engaged with during those plateaus
| because I wanted to, not because someone else told me I
| should or that it was important. The people who respond
| positively to being forced into things generally end up
| not knowing who _they_ are, and end up generally unwell
| people.
| kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote:
| > why does a child need to break through a plateau at
| anything?
|
| If for no other reason than to teach them that some
| things are worth persevering for.
|
| You can't teach kids to give up at the first sign of
| adversity...
| Loic wrote:
| The current trend, at least in Germany, is that as soon
| as a kid says "I do not want anymore.", this is normal to
| stop. With that, the kids do not have the experience that
| it can be hard, but going through _can_ bring something.
|
| Resilience, capacity to go through ups and downs, etc.
| are things you train by being exposed to it. If your life
| is only fun and joy as kid, the day you are hit hard as
| an adult, you have no training.
|
| But, this is my very personal point of view, education is
| very personal and very context specific, every family is
| different (country, culture, education, etc.) and in
| every family education is difficult from one kid to
| another. I am not trying to tell you how to educate your
| kids.
| toast0 wrote:
| > why does a child need to break through a plateau at
| anything?
|
| Learning that they can hit a plateau and move beyond it
| with concerted effort is super important. After you've
| done it once, you can look back on that experience for
| inspiration when there's a plateau that you want/need to
| move beyond.
|
| Having experience with struggling with something that is
| easy for some others is important too. Some kids are just
| naturally good at a lot of things when they're younger;
| which is nice in some ways, but makes it hard to learn
| skills to deal with challenges... It's great when they
| find something that challenges them (even if it doesn't
| seem great to them in the moment). Other kids have a hard
| time with most things; you've got to look out for things
| they can be good at.
| cpursley wrote:
| Yeah, but something vital happened: you learned the basics of
| music theory and how to sight read music - both prerequisites
| to jazz guitar (and something that most guitarists don't
| know). Learning piano is a great way to step into other
| musical instruments.
| __s wrote:
| You're using yourself as a refuting example, but at the end
| you disqualify yourself by being 4th out of 20000 in some
| undisclosed math ranking
| exe34 wrote:
| his whole point was that once he found joy in it, he could
| excel. I'm confident there's loads of things I could be
| good at - I'm only good at the things that I enjoy putting
| effort into.
| barry-cotter wrote:
| There are tens of thousands of people who love basketball
| playing right now and only 300 places in the NBA. Most
| people are average and never excel at anything, ever.
| Being 4th out of 20,000 is excelling and the proper
| response to someone using their own freakishly
| unrepresentative self as an example for normal people is
| to point out that they have no idea what it's like to be
| normal.
| r0fl wrote:
| "Joy" is not found in a day. People enjoy doing things they
| are good at.
|
| It takes a long time to get good at some things and those
| days suck.
| jasode wrote:
| _> "Joy" is not found in a day. People enjoy doing things
| they are good at._
|
| There's got to be more to it than your simplified
| breakdown.
|
| My first exposure to computer programming was fun and
| _instantly addictive_. There was no struggle to learn
| coding. Same childhood experience for guitar. Nobody was
| around to push me. There was no need for "discipline to
| practice". It was simply practice-was-natural-thing-to-do
| because I enjoyed it. I wasn't a child prodigy. I was
| finding early joy in programming and guitar -- even though
| I was very bad at it.
|
| On the other hand, I'm very skilled at cooking and
| Microsoft Excel. But I do not enjoy making any meals or
| fiddling with spreadsheets. Likewise, there are a lot of
| kids out there that hate farming but are actually very good
| at milking cows and running the tractor because their
| parents made them do the chores every day. Some kids then
| grow up to move to the city and leave behind the farm life
| for good. On the hand, some siblings will cherish farming
| and happily take over from the parents.
|
| That said, I'm aware of the "No True Scotsman" argument
| about "joy" : _If you _truly_ were skilled at cooking and
| MS Excel and farming, you 'd actually enjoy it._
|
| ok... so the meta question is ..... how does one tell the
| difference between _" skill precedes joy"_ vs _" The
| beatings will continue until morale improves!"_ ?
|
| There was a popular "Tiger Mother" book where Amy Chua's
| daughter has a meltdown in public and didn't want to be
| forced to play the violin anymore. That finally convinced
| the mom to stop. On the other hand, the older sister seemed
| ok with piano lessons. Maybe children are just different.
|
| TLDR of anecdotes above is _any theories of optimal child-
| development has to account for _counterexamples_ to the
| skill-vs-joy connection_ : Kids can find joy in things they
| are bad at. Kids can hate doing things they are good at.
| pclmulqdq wrote:
| I find tremendous joy in playing the piano today. That
| mostly started when I was about 20, ~15 years after I
| started playing the piano.
|
| It had its moments during the first 15 years of my life,
| but it was more of a competitive activity than an
| entertaining one. Conservatively, every fun hour had
| about 50 shitty hours when I was a serious piano student.
| Now it's 100% fun.
| 0xSKOOMA wrote:
| Same for me, I've learned programming, reverse
| engineering, music production, cooking, etc. I learned
| all these things not because I'm intrinsically in love
| with doing them, I just love having done them. This quote
| fits it perfectly, "I hate writing, but I love having
| written."
| BalinKing wrote:
| This is exactly the same for me--I grew up playing the
| piano for basically my entire childhood, but it was
| always a chore. I dropped it once I went to college and
| figured I'd never pick it up back up, but then I decided
| on a whim to learn a song I found online. But b/c now
| it's no longer just for the sake of lessons, it's become
| a hobby that I really enjoy in its own right (and indeed,
| all the forced practice growing up has greatly expanded
| the range of songs that I'm able to learn now).
| timcobb wrote:
| > It takes a long time to get good at some things and those
| days suck.
|
| If those days suck, chances are you won't get good at it.
| People like things that are engaging and develop their
| identity and understanding of themselves and the world,
| even more so than things they are good at.
| NalNezumi wrote:
| A counter argument is simply the observation that _some
| stuff, it takes time (and effort) before you find the joy in
| it_. Following your recepie, unless (as you say yourself)
| lucky teacher or wealthy parents, anything that doesn 't
| incite immediate reward will be of low interest. A kid will
| probably pick up that general pattern too:
|
| if joy can not be found in <T time, don't bother. And kids
| are not particularly known to be good at long horizon credit
| assignments, so that T is often hours, day, or maybe a week.
|
| My brother (now an professional artist) told me at teenage
| years "some stuff you just won't understand the beauty and
| the joy until you've at least put 100 hours in it". And
| that's true in so many things in life.
|
| I'm happy that one of my parent forced me to do some stuff
| (sports, music, language) even when I complained about it.
| Only 10 years later did I understand how valuable being able
| to speak another language fluently with minimal accent is,
| and how some of my fellow second generation migrants lost
| that ability, and regret it. (having to go to school on
| Saturday sucked as a kid)
| yuuu wrote:
| In your penultimate sentence, why did you put the period
| outside the parentheses instead of inside?
| BigParm wrote:
| This is exactly it.
|
| We fail at teaching a means with no end. Help them find an
| interesting end and they will achieve it by any means
| necessary.
|
| Our job as parents is to expose our kids to a wide variety of
| disciplines so that they can find their interest.
|
| I read that Elon Musk runs his private school this way. The
| kids narrow their focus quite early on. But of course there's
| tons of depth to study. So they actually get somewhere.
| pyfon wrote:
| My take is Maths, Science and English push. Everything else let
| them decide what they like. Do parents push kids at every damn
| subject?
| onetom wrote:
| I think everything else like, drawing, singing, gardening,
| exercise, meditation could all use a bit more pushing...
| t0bia_s wrote:
| Do you do things because someone force you or beacuse you have
| self motivation?
| hnthrow90348765 wrote:
| As an adult, you develop the agency to force yourself to do
| things you don't like doing
|
| I can tell you as someone who was never forced into any
| extracurricular activities and was forced to go to church-
| schools that you probably should force your kids to learn
| something well (and not send them to religious schools)
| t0bia_s wrote:
| You are not forced. You do stuffs you dont like because you
| racionally evaluate consequences that could probably not
| worth it if you don't do it. Why cannot we approach same
| attitude when raising kids?
| CivBase wrote:
| I spend at least 40 hr a week doing something I have no
| motivation for. Most people do. Even if you don't hate your
| job, would you actually do it if you weren't getting paid?
| t0bia_s wrote:
| Do you find it healthy? Doing stuffs that you hate? Isn't
| that a consequence of forced education system?
| dandanua wrote:
| > Most kids won't do difficult things if you don't push them.
|
| I guess it's true for adult humans, and other creatures as
| well. Instead of pushing, however, you should consider using
| other motivational methods (a simple prize for accomplishing
| something that you want from your kids works very well).
| Pushing can cause alienation and hate, which could affect their
| entire adult life.
| cpursley wrote:
| It's amazing how far the promise of a sticker or special
| treat will go for young ones.
| martindbp wrote:
| I think many adults don't push themselves because they were
| always pushed by others their entire lives. It's a form of
| learned helplessness. You never have a say in what to do, so
| you just do what you're told, nothing more.
| martindbp wrote:
| Many kids will do difficult stuff, just not the stuff you'd
| have in mind. Sometimes parents are right in what the kids
| should be focusing on, but I'd guess more than not they are
| wrong. For example, all the parents who discouraged heavy
| computer use or video games, when this is how most millennials
| came into programming and IT. Then there's the thing where a
| kid who is interested, obsessed even, learns SO much faster. I
| recall a story of a parent who wanted their child checked for
| learning disabilities and the psychologist exclaimed "Your son
| has memorized 350 Pokemon! It's not a question of learning
| ability, it's a question of motivation".
|
| In my view, if we let our children do what interests them, to
| some degree (of course anything taken to the extreme will
| likely fail, and it depends on the child), they are likely to
| cover way more territory, and probably more useful territory,
| than a child that is being forced and coerced. One of the many
| things my 7 year old has learned from Minecraft is an entire
| language (English), to a level which in the past (my
| generation) we didn't reach before perhaps 18 (and that was due
| to watching TV, not school). The other day I caught him taking
| notes on a piece of paper that said single = 1, double = 2,
| triple = 3, quadruple = 4, quintuple = 5, sextuple = 6. This is
| a child who should not be speaking English, but now he can
| write and spell it better than his native language, because we
| let him follow his passion. He's also learned a ton of
| engineering concepts and vocabulary, and has the ability to
| install mods, debug when they don't work, has a basic
| understanding of networking, IP addresses and on and on.
|
| He has no interest in playing an instrument right now, why
| should we force him? If the time comes and he wants to, he will
| learn it so much faster because he wants to get better.
| kif wrote:
| I'm not a parent myself, but something I've seen happen with an
| American family I know, is that they push their kids way too
| much to learn and do as many things as possible. They have
| their music lessons, their many clubs at school, several
| physical activities such as soccer, tennis, taekwondo. At some
| point you have to stop and wonder whether you're taking their
| childhood away.
|
| These kids barely have any free time. School during weekdays,
| activities during the weekend... worse than a full time job.
|
| I think there's a balance to be struck. Your kids don't need to
| be good at everything.
| electriclove wrote:
| Definitely agree though the alternative can quickly become
| all day spent on TikTok or YouTube shorts.
| A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 wrote:
| This. I have several people with kids similar age as mine
| in my circle, who seemingly gave up and now its all phone,
| pad or tv at all times. It is very easy to lose that kid to
| other distractions unless you provide enough of a structure
| for them.
| hkpack wrote:
| Every parent is fighting an uphill battle against the
| technology now.
|
| You either structure the day in such a way that there is
| literally no time for anything outside of activities, or you
| just observe the kid gets sucked into the screens with less
| and less will to do anything else.
| margalabargala wrote:
| That is a false dichotomy.
|
| If not at a club/activity, why does the child have
| unrestricted access to screens?
| hkpack wrote:
| Have you personally tried to keep a teen away from a
| screen? If you did with a success, I would really like to
| hear your story and what has worked for you.
|
| Looking at my kids friends / classmates, almost all of
| the parents just gave up, with the exception of a small
| group that is still trying with the discussed approach.
| margalabargala wrote:
| "Keeping teens away from screens"? And why are there
| screens?
|
| Sugar is addictive. One would not necessarily expect a
| teen to healthily control their sugar intake;
| accordingly, we don't put bowls of candy around the
| house, and if we did we certainly wouldn't be shocked
| when they emptied themselves, and then thrown up our
| hands and said "can't keep kids from candy, what can you
| do?".
|
| Our kids aren't teens yet, but the plan is for screen
| time to be whitelisted, that is, there are certain times
| and circumstances where screens are okay and the rest of
| the time they are not.
|
| EDIT: To elaborate on parenting philosophy a bit, one can
| provide structure (good) without being authoritarian
| (bad). Rather than bouncing between "you have all the
| options available, including screens, hope you make a
| good choice!" and "you are doing this specific activity
| now", one can provide unstructured time with lots of
| options available- reading, board game, doing something
| outdoors, creating a craft, etc- while having none of
| those options be screens.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Good luck with that. Please report back on how it goes.
| margalabargala wrote:
| Happy to, how would you like me to contact you? I don't
| think HN allows replies after threads have been multiple
| years dead...
| zerr wrote:
| Why not anxiety instead of laziness?
| alphazard wrote:
| This kind of forced practice can create the appearance of a
| certain level of competence, but it rarely produces a deep
| understanding or innate appreciation of any of those subjects.
|
| Take music, for example. Many high schoolers play an instrument
| as part of the college admissions game. Almost none of those
| kids can play music with their friends and just enjoy it. To
| them music is this structured activity where they get paper
| with dots on it, and they have to play the right notes at the
| right time to pass the class. These kids never develop a true
| understanding or appreciation for music. They don't keep their
| instruments or practice as adults.
|
| There's so many things to learn to be good at, why not find
| something that you actually like?
| timcobb wrote:
| > A very small minority of kids will do all of that easily and
| for the fun, but you can't rely on it
|
| This may be true, but explain to me what are the returns you
| get on forcing math (or anything) on kids? They won't like it,
| they won't learn it intimately, the won't internalize it, it'll
| be unusable knowledge and mostly a waste of time with lots of
| bad vibes and probably even a little trauma...
|
| I spent a lot of time with math in high school and college but
| that was because I had a couple teachers who really elucidated
| why *I* might find math to be interesting (in my case, it was
| physics and computing). Forcing people to do anything generally
| leads to nothing worthwhile.
| apwell23 wrote:
| what does it mean to "push" ?
|
| they used to beat the living shit out of us india when were
| growing up. is that what you mean?
| doright wrote:
| Double-edged sword IMO. I was mandated to a half hour of piano
| practice early on, and I came to dread it. But in my experience
| that was less having to do with being pushed to practice, and
| more I loathed my parents overhearing my piano playing and
| thinking they'd come down and criticize me for not trying hard
| enough. This was an uncommon occurrence, but it occurred enough
| to plant the seeds of anxiety in my mind.
|
| The _nature_ of pushing needs to be considered in the sense of
| the overall parent-child relationship, and not just being
| handed a Mikrokosmos and an egg timer. If my parents were more
| proud of my ability to push forward and took interest in the
| piano and my playing beyond just performing good at recitals, I
| probably would have grown up to truly enjoy performing music.
| Today I 'm left with a bit of a bad taste in my mouth that
| would require conceited effort to overcome. So I guess my
| parents weren't "lazy" in your terms but a bit too strict for
| me to conclude I would be "good at music" that early.
| tom89999 wrote:
| But should the parent decide if the kid will become a musician?
| What if its not talented and pushing it with force to
| mechanically play Mozart? I later became interested in playing
| bass guitar, nobody forced me. I did it for leisure. Children
| are and will not be experts in all fields. Sure you are right
| that some discipline is needed to move forward and to keep up
| with something. Do you remember and use everything you ever
| learned in school, if its not needed for your current job? Kids
| nowadays spent half to 3/4 of the day in school or outside
| their own home. When should they be kids? I understand the
| pressure of parents to make sure they have good grades, some is
| necessary, but not really all of it. I never learned touch type
| in school. I did that on my own after work within half a year.
| I did it because i was interested in. Worked 20 years in IT.
| Now i am currently trying to get my amateur radio license, i
| use my knowledge that i collected so far, allthough i was bad
| at math in school. Life is a journey, i got three professions
| so far.
| ForOldHack wrote:
| At first I am reluctant to agree. But I decided to take math
| and English every year. I sucked at math, and had to figure out
| how to get good on my own. Now I have a degree. Math and music
| go hand in hand. I hated the music I was learning, so I quit
| lessons, and got the music I wanted to learn and struggled to
| learn it and I got muh better. I am an avid reader.
|
| I reluctantly admit that you are right, and I am the better for
| it because I overcame my lazyness and found joy, in math,
| English, reading, and music. I sing, play piano, guitar, and
| listen with appreciation.
| hdjjhhvvhga wrote:
| > Most kids won't do difficult things if you don't push them.
|
| I roughly classify parents in two groups: (1) like the author
| of the article, (2) like you. Based on my limited observation,
| neither can be claimed to give optimal results, and it more
| boils down to "see what actually works for your kid in the long
| term" which unfortunately far too often can only be definitely
| said in hindsight.
| trod1234 wrote:
| Its not a good take because no alternative is provided, but the
| author does notice something important that 99% of other people
| don't notice today. They don't realize it explicitly, but the
| actions do recognize it implicitly.
|
| The school system today uses elements, structures, and
| clusters, the same techniques used in real torture. Its
| embedded into the structure of by-rote pedagogy starting in the
| late 1970s, and it also goes by another name starting in the
| 90s, where Administrators, NEA representatives, and Teachers,
| call this "Lying to Children".
|
| Most parents today seem to be simply too busy, treating school
| like daycare, or maybe they just don't love their children
| enough to put the time in to protect them and figure out what
| is actually happening to their kids.
|
| Classic curricula followed the western philosophy of the
| greeks, you develop tools that let you reduce a working system
| to first principles (in guided manner), which are proven true,
| and then you use those principles to model the system accurate,
| and then predict the future parts of that system.
|
| "Lying to Children" does the exact opposite in time. It starts
| with a flawed model that is useless teaching abstract concepts
| and includes other unrelated concepts that arise naturally from
| that flawed model. The student is then as mastery progresses
| forced to struggle to unlearn material that isn't correct, and
| then relearn the finer details with each new flawed model given
| in a progressive fashion, over, and over, and over, becoming
| more useful yes, but torturing themselves, and in a way
| destroying themselves in the process.
|
| When questions or true insights occur, the flawed model breaks
| those insights requiring you to do things differently in
| earlier classes before you can use those, but not even this
| information is given so you can't leap frog the torture.
|
| There are additional strategic structures that orchestrate
| failures to gatekeep technical fields like math. There is an
| Algebra->Geometry->Trigonometry sequence which uses a gimmick
| in undisclosed pass criteria between class 1 and class 3, so
| the student passes initially but then fails and has to go back
| to Algebra, but can't because its sequential. Its called
| burning the bridge.
|
| Regardless, the student is blamed, no help is given (because
| there is no cure for torture). They are told, "maybe you're
| just not a math person, you should choose a career that doesn't
| use this if your having trouble.
|
| This gatekeeper is orchestrated to induce PTSD towards math in
| general, and as all technical fields require math this prevents
| them from entering those fields. Some are able to pass and
| enter these professions, but never the best and brightest, only
| the most compliant with blinders.
|
| The exception to this is if you bypassed the entire process
| through private boarding school, and Ivy league college
| straightaway. If your an elite, you get a decent education.
|
| These structures follow a false ideology based in
| gnosis/gnosticism which is long refuted, but that hasn't
| stopped these things from being used for purpose, or allowed
| others to remove these.
|
| There is an all out war that has been happening for years, a
| war on our children. Compare low attention spans and other
| things with the documented characteristics of torture from PoWs
| and you'll see there are parallels everywhere.
|
| The thousand yard stare. Hollowed out feelings. Lashing out.
| These are often referenced in the material on torture.
|
| The problem is unlike adults, once broken and distorted by
| torture children carry that forward their entire lives, unable
| to change because its not learning, its torture, and there are
| very few who ever recover.
|
| Failing to see the reality of what is happening and calling it
| lazy and complacent without understanding is problematic and
| most definitely not the sign of a good parent if that means you
| let your children's minds be destroyed under a false belief
| that its just laziness.
|
| For those parents that are unaware of what I mean by torture.
| You can read books on the subject matter by Joost Meerloo, or
| Robert Lifton. From the case studies you can derive the
| requirements and you would be shocked to find and recognize
| these things being used everywhere today without you knowing.
| Robert Cialdini touches on the psychological blindspots used
| which bypass your and your children's perception to the issue.
|
| The elements are isolation, cognitive dissonance, coercion with
| real or perceived loss, and lack of agency to remove oneself
| from the situation. Some would argue this also includes time
| and exposure.
|
| Structuring and Clustering, forces active engagement through
| specially designed circular trauma loops, forcing the psyche
| back on itself to destroy itself, and narco-synthesis and
| narco-analysis which in the 50s used barbituates to trigger
| dopamine are used today through associative priming through
| many ways including your phone (gamification uses many of these
| things learned from research on torture).
|
| It is established that those who are drugged have less
| resistance to torture, and those with faith-based beliefs tend
| to resist torture better. One of the first things to go under
| torture is rational thought.
| swat535 wrote:
| I think there's also a significant cultural dimension to this
| discussion.
|
| For example, in many Middle Eastern and Asian cultures (pardon
| my generalization here), there's an ingrained expectation that
| children should be pushed, often quite hard, especially in
| areas like mathematics, science, engineering, and law. Hence
| the old cliche: "You have three career options: doctor, lawyer,
| or engineer.".
|
| I've seen this firsthand as a Middle Easterner (I was born in
| IRAN). My father is an engineer, and both my parents were
| relentless when it came to academic discipline. I ended up in
| computer science, and my brother became a pharmaceutical
| researcher after obtaining his PHD.. There's no question that
| this kind of structure and pressure produced tangible results.
| But I'd be lying if I said it was an easy or joyful process. It
| ended up costing me plenty of social anxieties and now I
| struggle with social dynamics.
|
| That said, I have mixed feelings about it. While the rigor pays
| off in terms of career and technical competence, it often comes
| at the cost of creativity, intrinsic motivation, and the space
| to explore things like literature, music, and the arts. I
| sometimes wonder what paths we might have followed if
| exploration had been valued as highly as performance.
|
| So I _partially_ agree with you that some degree of external
| motivation is necessary, especially with children who haven't
| yet developed discipline. But I also think we should be careful
| not to frame this solely as a matter of "lazy" vs. "good"
| parenting. Upon reflection, I think that there's a balance
| between encouragement, discipline, and allowing for the
| development of intrinsic interest. Different families,
| cultures, and even individual children may need to strike this
| in different ways.
| jblecanard wrote:
| This is all fun and games until your kid has school assignments
| with deadlines
| treve wrote:
| In the Netherlands we didn't get homework until 12 and lots of
| play time. Curious how that stacks up to other places.
| neom wrote:
| I think this isn't quite the same thing, never the less: I have
| dyscalculia on extreme mode (/dyslexia/autism), and I was forced
| to do math in the 90s in the UK, rote style. I don't know if they
| didn't know about dyscalculia, didn't care, or whatever, but holy
| hell I wish I'd never been forced to do that, it's still today a
| fairly painful memory and I'm in my 40s now. If you're gonna
| force kids into math, at least make sure they're not unable to
| process it correctly.
| 0xDEAFBEAD wrote:
| Something I've been thinking a lot about is "stealth edutainment"
| games.
|
| When I was a kid, I remember "edutainment" games that were
| basically like normal computer games, except every so often a
| homework problem pops up.
|
| I think that doesn't work super well. Better is a game which has
| you learning naturally, in order to play the game more
| effectively. For example, I've been enjoying the computer game
| Slay the Spire recently, and there is a great deal of mental math
| which is inherent to the game. If I had a kid, I think I might
| give them that game as a method to motivate them to learn
| arithmetic.
| hilbert42 wrote:
| I'm damed sure I'd be much worse at math if I'd not been pushed
| in a formal environment such as a school classroom.
|
| I liked math--especially calculus as it made sense to me--but
| parts became a drudgery when I could see no reason for studying
| them.
|
| Right, there's always the kid in class who excels at math like a
| mini Euler and gets bored because the rest can't keep up but the
| majority of us aren't like that--doing Bessel functions and
| Fourier stuff as abstract mathematics without any seeming purpose
| can seem pointless and our only interest in them was to pass
| exams. (Teaching may be better these days but my textbooks never
| discussed the value of learning these aspects of mathematics.)
|
| Later whilst studying elec eng/electronics it became very obvious
| to me how important these aspects of mathematics were. If I'd
| been given some practical examples of why this math was useful
| then I'd have been much more enthusiastic.
|
| Same goes for the history of mathematics, I'm old enough to have
| had a small textbook full of log and trig tables yet if someone
| had asked me at highschool who John Napier was I wouldn't have
| had a clue. In hindsight, that was terrible.
|
| Mathematics is often taught as if the student was going to become
| a mathematician a la Hardy or Ramanujan and I'm firmly of the
| belief this is not the best approach for the average student let
| alone those with few math skills.
|
| Mathematics ought to be taught with the real world in mind for
| ease of understanding. For example, it's dead easy to represent
| AC power as a sine wave and from there use that mathematical fact
| to solve power problems. (Perhaps maths and physics texts should
| be written in tandem and synced to show relevance.)
|
| Teachers need to take time to explain that math isn't just
| abstract concepts but that it's very relevant to everyday life
| and that tying up mathematical functions to things in the real
| world is actually interesting and enjoyable.
| Viliam1234 wrote:
| > (Perhaps maths and physics texts should be written in tandem
| and synced to show relevance.)
|
| I agree with most of what you wrote, but this part is tricky.
| Yes, it would be nice to have math and physics textbooks
| synced. Maybe other subjects, too.
|
| But writing a textbook is a lot of work; it can take years. How
| do we get two textbooks synced, if they are written by
| different people? One writes their book first, then the other
| has to match it? What if the other disagrees with how the first
| book was organized? They both write together? Now there is a
| risk that one does a good job, another does a bad job, and the
| good textbook is connected to the bad one.
|
| Or maybe write the common outline first, and then each author
| is trying to follow it independently? Plus, there could be
| multiple versions of each book, following the same outline, so
| each math textbook can be connected with each physics textbook
| based on the same outline. Here the problem is that people
| often disagree on the outline.
|
| Also, not sure how important is this part, having things in
| sync could slow down the improvement in the future. For
| example, imagine that we figure out a better way to teach
| something in physics. But now everyone is used to having math
| and physics textbooks synced, so the new physics books would be
| rejected, until someone rewrites the math books too.
| onetom wrote:
| Learning is pain, knowing is pleasure...
| tim333 wrote:
| Learning can be fun.
| huvarda wrote:
| This article has all the tells of being AI generated with random
| bolding and constant emdashes.
| jjgreen wrote:
| _Know what, brother? I tell you that studying the humanities in
| high school is more important than mathematics -- mathematics is
| too sharp an instrument, no good for kids._
|
| Stephan Banach quoted by Steinhaus in _Through a reporter's eyes_
| , Roman Kaluza, 1995
| jeandejean wrote:
| I expected way more than a personal opinion coated in some
| moralization.
| explorigin wrote:
| Everybody is different. Some should be forced to learn and others
| not. Quit trying to measure fish on a tree climbing test.
| credit_guy wrote:
| A lot of people hope there is a magical way of making learning
| fun. The argument generally goes "young kids love exploring
| nature, experimenting, etc, so we are all inborn scientists. If
| only school did not extinguish the fire from us".
|
| A huge problem is that giants of education such as Jean Piaget
| and Seymour Papert make a strong case for this. Unfortunately
| they generalized their own experience as kids to all others. They
| did not understand that they were exceptional cases, and what
| applies to them does not necessarily apply to 99.999% of the rest
| of the world.
|
| But their message was so cool, somewhat similar to "we can all
| love each others", or "world peace", that it was embraced with
| abandon.
|
| I was fortunate to have a great math educator in college (i.e. a
| guy who was teaching us, math majors, how to tech moth to kids).
| He told us bluntly "math is hard".
|
| I think education would progress if one simply accepted this
| truth "math is hard". Stop the delusion that there is a way to
| make all math fun.
|
| Still, once you accept that math is hard, you realize that the
| mission is the same: try to find ways so that learning math is
| less hard and more fun. But accept that the default state is that
| math is hard. There is no "royal road" to math. Aristotle was
| onto something.
|
| And by the way, the fact that "math is hard" is not all bad news.
| The goal in school is not only to learn math, but also to learn
| how to work hard. There are kids for whom math feels like
| swimming for a dolphin. Up to a point. There will inevitably be a
| point where they will hit the phase of "math is hard". And it's
| going to come as a rude shock. It's better for this realization
| to come a bit early in life and a bit less shocking.
| _madmax_ wrote:
| At some point you have to force them for the sake of homework,
| just saying.
|
| But yeah, you're better off in math if you can make it make sense
| on a philosophical level. That I agree with.
| flint wrote:
| Get a set of dominoes. Make up games with them.
| 1970-01-01 wrote:
| Humans are more terrible at teaching math than any other concept.
| I remember being taught algebra by a teacher that had terrible
| idiosyncrasies. She would sometimes write numbers and variables
| differently, and this caused major problems trying to understand
| how and why the variable was to be written differently due to new
| context. But she would just go on writing it differently, just
| because she was weird. For example, she would sometimes write 'x'
| using two curves that didn't touch ')(' and expected you to
| continue with the algebra equation as if nothing was strange. My
| point is that teachers still don't understand how to correctly
| teach math to students. They reinforce using their old methods
| that are overall sloppy shorthand in a space where rigor, both
| visually and conceptually, must be maintained. When young minds
| are this fresh, you cannot have this slop and idiosyncrasy in
| your lessons and expect students to become enlightened. So no,
| forcing them to do some math is not harmful. Poor teaching in a
| very hard space definitely is harmful.
| balderdash wrote:
| My claims are as follows: - most math programs in the US schools
| are behind where children's math abilities are - most school math
| programs do an abysmal job connecting math with real life - you
| can completely turn off a child to a subject/sport/activity by
| pushing it too hard -being numerate is a real long term advantage
| in life
|
| It's balancing these things that's hard, if your children are
| above "pace" math wise, see the value of math in their everyday
| life, and are on track to be numerate, yes don't push, otherwise
| not pushing is the disservice
| the_arun wrote:
| Every kid is different. We can't generalize the approach.
| tom89999 wrote:
| Must add i had struggles with mathematics. It can be interesting,
| but little did i understand as a pupil. Later in life, i
| discovered it, i became a car mechanic, then it-guy, then non-
| destructive tester. English is my first and only second language,
| its enough to lurk here, read books and serve customers on a
| professional level. I think i dont need french, nobody around me
| speaks it, i am not interested going to france..at all. All the
| math i was thaught, was do to the job and that filled my fridge.
| Its okay to push kids to university so they can use that math
| knowledge, but who foresees what the kid wants to work? School is
| not the end of the road, one can always attend courses, getting
| autodidactic knowledge later in life. Today we dont need 10
| architects while having only 1 roof tyler.....
| tim333 wrote:
| I'm reminded of another HN comment on learning math, more pitched
| at advanced maths but probably still applicable
|
| >...recommendation is a metaprinciple: enjoy mathematics.
| Benjamin Finegold said similarly that the secret to chess is to
| enjoy every move. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42290996
|
| Since then I've watched a few times Ben's beginners chess advice
| aimed at kids and feel it can apply to other things, math or in
| my case I'm trying to apply it to trading. It's been quite good.
| The basic idea, enjoy doing the thing and do it repeatedly so you
| build pattern recognition https://youtu.be/B5bCfwCyo18
| NickC25 wrote:
| As a counterpoint, look at how the Polgar sisters were raised.
|
| Yes, Lazlo and his wife were both education professionals, and
| spent an inordinate amount of time dedicated to developing the
| girls. But look how it turned out.
|
| On a different note, I used to hate sport when my parents forced
| me to play it. I liked screwing around on the computer or playing
| video games. However, when I found tennis naturally around 12 or
| 13, I couldn't get enough of it, and vastly improved on my own
| because I had a lot more fun playing than most of my peers did,
| who were forced into it by their parents. Most of them don't even
| play for fun anymore with friends, and I'm in my mid 30s and
| still play frequently.
| globular-toast wrote:
| I think you might be like me. If I'm forced to do something I
| won't like it. But it's up to me I can find almost anything fun
| or interesting.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| I do agree with the overall premise of encouraging children's
| creativity and the things that they enjoy doing. You don't want
| math to become a chore.
|
| On the other hand, some things require study and practice to be
| really good at, and that is "work", and many kids don't want to
| do the work.
|
| Our boy, who just turned 9, is very good at math (his school's
| standardized tests put him at 99th percentile in the US for his
| grade level, though 1) I don't put a lot of stock in those
| standardized tests, and 2) the US doesn't exactly rank high in
| math skills, so this is less impressive than it sounds). He's not
| a genius, but he grasps concepts quickly and fairly intuitively.
| He's curious about the world, asks lots of questions, and is
| capable of understanding and retaining many scientific concepts
| that kids older than him would struggle with. (Example: two days
| ago, he was asking me about quantum computers and I mentioned
| that they need to be kept very cold, he asked whether they use
| oxygen, because oxygen turns to liquid at -173C. I thought he
| just made that up, but when I checked (I didn't know myself), he
| was pretty close (the actual number is -183C.) So he has the
| innate talent to work with.
|
| But despite his gifts, he still needs practice for the math
| concepts to take root, and without that he makes a fair share of
| basic mistakes; and he still needs to improve his logic reasoning
| skills. So he has daily math homework after school (because math
| instruction in elementary schools in the US is low). We use
| Singapore Math workbooks (I've tried various apps and online
| programs, and honestly, paper workbooks are just better--but
| that's another topic).
|
| He knows he's good at math and wants to continue to excel at it.
| (Just like a talented basketball player doesn't reach his full
| potential without working at it, something I repeatedly emphasize
| to him.) BUT he still struggles every single day to do his
| homework, because he prefers to play video games, shoot hoops,
| etc. (loves basketball, football, soccer, but has a lifelong
| physical disability that will prevent him from ever playing a
| team sport, to his great chagrin). I have to push him every
| single day or he would simply not do it. He actually wants to do
| math, and when we talk about it, he'll confirm that, but when it
| comes time to actually do it, he just doesn't have the willpower.
| (I mean, what kid prefers to practice math problems instead of
| play video games?). Hopefully he'll get the willpower at some
| point when he's older. But that day has not yet come.
|
| That was a long reply to say: it sometimes does take a lot of
| pushing.
| blueboo wrote:
| _taps the Case Against Algebra II sign_
|
| https://harpers.org/archive/2013/09/wrong-answer/
| kaffekaka wrote:
| I believe that the most important thing I can show my kids is how
| I pursue the things I enjoy. That I make time for myself and that
| I handle setbacks and dips in motivation. So that they will know
| that when you do find something that interests you, that is how
| you pursue it in the long run. I _show_ them how to not quit.
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