I’m still not a paid sub, so not sure how much my input matters, but I LOVE the idea of this book! We homeschool (kiddo is only 6, but has a very natural grasp of numbers), and while I’m fairly decent at math, my husband is not…or at least, thinks he’s not. I loved algebra when I was in school (I think I like that it just…works), and I’m proud to say that I just rocked my way through a chapter of high school chemistry calculation exercises for our coo-op. 💪🏻 But I joke that I agreed to homeschool because I forgot there was such a thing as geometry. 😂 I hate geometry. I hated it in high school, and I hate having to reteach a first-grade version of it now.
That said, I have a very clear memory from high school related to trigonometry. After moving cross-country between my freshman and sophomore year, I learned that my new school required physics to graduate. I took it immediately, “to get it out of the way,” at the same time that I was enrolled in Alg 2. Algebra was fine, physics was…fine. It was hard, but the teacher was decent, and I made it through. The next year, I started in on Trig/pre-calc, and recognized almost immediately how much easier the physics would have been had I known trigonometry. To this day, that eureka moment stands out in my mind as something “about math” that I knew, or was able to come to know, or something.
I’m really looking forward to this project - I hope you go through with it: my family will be among the first purchasers!
Culture is upstream of politics, and preserving Culture is a greater challenge and more powerful benefit than momentary rewards from flailing at the current political thing.
Working a math book to aid others in overcoming their fear of a useful language is a huge potential benefit to individuals, and the larger culture. Press on, young lady.
Awesome and commendable idea, pivoting to non-culture wars topics. And this is a great topic to switch to!
Mathematics has the difficulty, as a subhect, is that it is progressive and systematic: each stage is dependent on what you learned before in a way few other subjects are. If you stumble at one step, and fall behind, it is harder and harder to catch up. Most people abandon the subject entirely as soon as they could.
Roger Penrose has estimated, from his many talks with people who are "bad at math" (which might be almost everyone he meets besides himself?), that it is the cancelling of like terms in fractions where most people fall by the wayside and never catch up. When I got back into math in graduate school (philosophy, where it was very relevant) I drilled myself on this for a few hours, and then all the difficulties I believed I had with math vanished.
I printed out all of the How Not To Suck at Math series. I plan to homeschool because with my schedule I’d only see my kids for a hour a day otherwise and that’s unacceptable.
Math got hard when we got to fractions and they added letters. I had to take two classes my senior year so I could graduate.
Now I hear my boss talking about writing formulas to figure something out and it’s all Klingon to me.
After tutoring students for 20 years, mostly for math, I've come to the conclusion that the majority of those who have difficulty with math are suffering from an emotional reaction rather than an intellectual deficiency. At the risk of sounding "woke", it is important to create a safe space for such students to explore those aspects of math with which they have difficulty, thereby putting the emotional trauma behind them. I constantly run into students suffering from poor instruction more than anything else. I often hear, "Why didn't my teacher tell me that?" There's no good answer to that question.
Correct. The vast majority of people could get through Calculus 1, in my opinion, and more than half through Calculus 2. It's 90% teaching and 10% ability.
Long ago, in the dawn of time (1966), my academic advisor at university talked me out of changing my major to computer science. He assured me that mathematics was a better choice because "There will always be a need for mathematicians to navigate airplanes." So I switched to math and did OK until Advanced Calculus. The instructor was Japanese, and I had a lot of trouble understanding what he said. I dropped the course, and tried again a semester later. This time the instructor was American-born, and I still couldn't understand what he was talking about. I managed to complete a degree without advanced calculus, but am just barely able to help a grandchild with high school math. My minor in computer science got me started on a great career in IT, where the only numbers I need to worry about are 0 and 1. That's probably why my favorite math topic is Boolean Algebra. And I have yet to see a help-wanted ad for navigator at an airline.
My math instructors in college were Indian, South Korean, and Turkish... could barely understand them let alone the math also. But i did learn that "you Americans are so stupid"
Math…my trouble with it started in 7th grade. I’d been in the gifted program since forever and so began pre algebra at the same time I began junior high. In hindsight I realize that was a big part of the problem. I was very worried about fitting in and I had a teacher who didn’t seem like she cared anything about math, teaching, or her students. She was probably just tired. Anyway, I didn’t understand why there were letters in my math book. It sounds comical now, but I think if she had just said, “that X is a placeholder. You are just trying to figure out what the actual number is” —I probably would have been ok. So simple. Instead, I spent the year NOT understanding and not asking questions and hiding the fact that I was lost. I didn’t want to stand out and I didn’t want to look stupid. I thought maybe I really was stupid and now everyone would know it. I learned just enough to get by and cheated on the rest in order to pass the class. Because my grades were decent no one noticed. The next year for algebra I had an even worse teacher. She was everything the 7th grade teacher was plus mean and scary. She was also the aunt of a popular cheerleader so you couldn’t even gossip about how awful she was!! Also, I had a crush on a very cute boy in that class and there was no way I wanted to look stupid in front of him!! More cheating, minimal learning and more feeling terrible about how “dumb” I was. Once again, I didn’t tell anyone that I was lost and my grades camouflaged my confusion. Meanwhile I was getting A’s in all my humanities classes and actually setting the curve in my science class. This was when the “I’m just not a math person” took root. The next year I started high school and took geometry. I decided ahead of time that I was tired of cheating and feeling dumb. My teacher wasn’t amazing, but I was determined to give it my very best effort. Guess what? I did very well!! I even liked proofs!! Geometry was great!! I thought my math problems were over. In 10th grade came algebra 2 and I was right back to being lost. I finally had a good teacher, but I was so disheartened to be lost again and I had so many holes in my basic understanding of algebra that despite her best efforts I felt really dumb. My pride would never let me explain to her how lost I was. I didn’t cheat this time and I barely pulled a C. I was embarrassed as I was a solid honor/AP student in everything else. I was relieved that my High School requirements let me stop taking math at that point and so that’s exactly what I did. I gave up. I graduated 11th in my class of over 400, but I did it believing math was my kryptonite. I went on to become a high school teacher, but I taught English. I’m now almost 50 and still avoid math.
I have heard so many variations on this story! They missed one thing — usually because their parents divorced or their grandparent died and they had a two to three week period where they were either absent or present without the ability to pay attention. They lost some key piece and never found it, and math was lost in general. You are not alone.
I think the saddest part is that it was so easy to sell myself short. To believe the trope “I’m just not a math person” and get virtually no pushback from anybody at the time. In the end, it made me a better, more compassionate teacher but it’s something I still think about and wonder “what if?”
"Losing a key piece and never finding it" sounds much like my experience with high school math -- though in my case, it was in large part, looking back on it from thirty-five-plus years later, because I was mentally checked-out of pretty much everything "school" my freshman and sophomore years and put myself in a hole that I was barely able to dig myself out of in time to graduate with my class. That and math was the subject in school (aside from P.E.) that I cared about the least to begin with.
I appreciate the offer, but I’ve had good friends publish books with major publishers and I would rather be livestreamed skinning myself alive than go through a publisher, LOL.
Hahaha! I'm sure she would also counsel against publishing with her company, but she is passionate about maths education and if you think an experienced editor would be helpful I'll can reach out.
I would buy this book. The problem with a lot of the genius mathematics training privately available in the UK is that it’s very secretive. Schools pay providers of basic things like fractions training (I saw a guy using styrofoam cups but couldn’t work out how he used them from the short clip on TV) thousands of pounds per visit.
Advanced calc in college was a dividing line for me. I just couldn’t get it. I still think that maths is just naturally easy for some over others. But I also did well in a discrete math class taught by a grad student who proved to me this deficit can be overcome with quality instruction.
Based on my enjoyment of your essays, I would enjoy your math tome. My math aversion started with Euclidean Geometry, and my light switch moment occurred in midsummer school. Any new exposures like chemistry and Algebra II extinguish all self-confidence in this 70-year-old.
I miss your culture war takes. In my opinion, society needs more like yours because you brought nuances to your takes and they often made me think about things differently. Our society needs MORE of that even if you are unable to provide them. Of course it would be better if these nuanced conversations could happen in person.
That said, the first time I had a problem with math was college. Linear algebra and, to an extent, differential equations, kicked my ass. Not to mention matrix math. So I'm guessing I'm not the target of your proposed book.
My son is into stats, being a modern sports fan and all, so hopefully, that plays into it some. And while he loves logic, I think he's had some algebra issues and trig will challenge him a lot.
I miss writing them sometimes. But whatever tiny shred of doubt I had was erased by watching real, non-bot (yes, I checked) conservative accounts go at Kyle Rittenhouse and tell him they wished he'd been convicted so he could get fucked (they meant raped) like the bitch he is. That and what I saw on Substack Notes told me that the punishment for failing right-of-center purity tests is beyond what I am capable of suffering while remaining sane.
Simple analytic geometry, for me, sadly. Plane geometry was great. And I was told that if I found analytic geometry hard, then trigonometry would be impossible. And I believed what I was told, in those days. Will buy your book when you self-publish. I hope there will be a physical version with a binding that allows it to lay open flat (with big margins!), along with the online, possibly interactive, version.
I don't know if this is the kind of feedback you're looking for, but when "Whole Word Reading" is described to me it sounds eerily familiar to how some of my math classes were taught. Algebra in particular.
My son is homeschooling himself when it comes to math. He just looks at it and numbers pop out of his mouth. Correct, well reasoned numbers. He's 10 and we're already in highschool geometry. My husband is like that. He's a PhD engineer. He can plot graph points in his head. I can't even add without fingers. I always loved the idea of math. But I dropped out of precalculus in highschool because failing was going to destroy my GPA and I'd lose any chances of getting a scholarship. I don't know what it is about the numbers but they squish around. They won't hold still and it all blurs and I can't see it anymore. I have to have paper, silence, and a calculator just to convert ratios for a recipe. I wish I was better at math. I love the idea of math. Physics was my favorite class in highschool. I remember the joy of solving the problems once I understood the equations. Every time I saw calculus or statistics on prerequisites for majors I would feel so sad. "You can't do that," echoed in my young mind. I wished I'd tried anyway. That was 30 years ago.
If you want to learn pre-calculus, and I think you would enjoy it (if you enjoyed physics, you'll love it) then this really is something you can do yourself. Khan Academy has a free precalculus course. I would suggest ordering a pre-calc textbook off Amazon and combining Khan Academy and Krista King (https://www.kristakingmath.com/). Your having enjoyed physics tells me that you would find learning precalculus deeply fulfilling and fun, and you'd be very proud of yourself, too.
Hi Holly, Thank you again for a thoughtful post. I am not sure how a math book would be helpful for me. My dad was a physicist who helped invent/create electron microscopes, and he could read an equation and visualize the form it described in his mind's eye. I need a more practical approach; a way to work with math in the real world where I can see and use equations. I read the first three of your articles on math and struggled through them. But I was a machinist for 30 years, and I kept a piece of paper with drawings of the pythagorean theory type stuff. In other words, formulas beside the shape they described. I would take it out to help me when a practical machining problem required me to have the right formula, and to know, for example, which surface on a part I was machining was represented by the "a," "b," or "c" of the formula. I made very few mistakes using this method over the years.
I'm not sure how a book could be written that would fit with whatever is that way of approaching math.
I’m still not a paid sub, so not sure how much my input matters, but I LOVE the idea of this book! We homeschool (kiddo is only 6, but has a very natural grasp of numbers), and while I’m fairly decent at math, my husband is not…or at least, thinks he’s not. I loved algebra when I was in school (I think I like that it just…works), and I’m proud to say that I just rocked my way through a chapter of high school chemistry calculation exercises for our coo-op. 💪🏻 But I joke that I agreed to homeschool because I forgot there was such a thing as geometry. 😂 I hate geometry. I hated it in high school, and I hate having to reteach a first-grade version of it now.
That said, I have a very clear memory from high school related to trigonometry. After moving cross-country between my freshman and sophomore year, I learned that my new school required physics to graduate. I took it immediately, “to get it out of the way,” at the same time that I was enrolled in Alg 2. Algebra was fine, physics was…fine. It was hard, but the teacher was decent, and I made it through. The next year, I started in on Trig/pre-calc, and recognized almost immediately how much easier the physics would have been had I known trigonometry. To this day, that eureka moment stands out in my mind as something “about math” that I knew, or was able to come to know, or something.
I’m really looking forward to this project - I hope you go through with it: my family will be among the first purchasers!
Culture is upstream of politics, and preserving Culture is a greater challenge and more powerful benefit than momentary rewards from flailing at the current political thing.
Working a math book to aid others in overcoming their fear of a useful language is a huge potential benefit to individuals, and the larger culture. Press on, young lady.
Awesome and commendable idea, pivoting to non-culture wars topics. And this is a great topic to switch to!
Mathematics has the difficulty, as a subhect, is that it is progressive and systematic: each stage is dependent on what you learned before in a way few other subjects are. If you stumble at one step, and fall behind, it is harder and harder to catch up. Most people abandon the subject entirely as soon as they could.
Roger Penrose has estimated, from his many talks with people who are "bad at math" (which might be almost everyone he meets besides himself?), that it is the cancelling of like terms in fractions where most people fall by the wayside and never catch up. When I got back into math in graduate school (philosophy, where it was very relevant) I drilled myself on this for a few hours, and then all the difficulties I believed I had with math vanished.
I printed out all of the How Not To Suck at Math series. I plan to homeschool because with my schedule I’d only see my kids for a hour a day otherwise and that’s unacceptable.
Math got hard when we got to fractions and they added letters. I had to take two classes my senior year so I could graduate.
Now I hear my boss talking about writing formulas to figure something out and it’s all Klingon to me.
After tutoring students for 20 years, mostly for math, I've come to the conclusion that the majority of those who have difficulty with math are suffering from an emotional reaction rather than an intellectual deficiency. At the risk of sounding "woke", it is important to create a safe space for such students to explore those aspects of math with which they have difficulty, thereby putting the emotional trauma behind them. I constantly run into students suffering from poor instruction more than anything else. I often hear, "Why didn't my teacher tell me that?" There's no good answer to that question.
Correct. The vast majority of people could get through Calculus 1, in my opinion, and more than half through Calculus 2. It's 90% teaching and 10% ability.
My grandfather used to say "Calculus teachers make it look hard so that they will look smart."
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES!
Our school district uses experienced hs calculus teachers to help new teaches learn how to teach calculus
Long ago, in the dawn of time (1966), my academic advisor at university talked me out of changing my major to computer science. He assured me that mathematics was a better choice because "There will always be a need for mathematicians to navigate airplanes." So I switched to math and did OK until Advanced Calculus. The instructor was Japanese, and I had a lot of trouble understanding what he said. I dropped the course, and tried again a semester later. This time the instructor was American-born, and I still couldn't understand what he was talking about. I managed to complete a degree without advanced calculus, but am just barely able to help a grandchild with high school math. My minor in computer science got me started on a great career in IT, where the only numbers I need to worry about are 0 and 1. That's probably why my favorite math topic is Boolean Algebra. And I have yet to see a help-wanted ad for navigator at an airline.
My math instructors in college were Indian, South Korean, and Turkish... could barely understand them let alone the math also. But i did learn that "you Americans are so stupid"
Math…my trouble with it started in 7th grade. I’d been in the gifted program since forever and so began pre algebra at the same time I began junior high. In hindsight I realize that was a big part of the problem. I was very worried about fitting in and I had a teacher who didn’t seem like she cared anything about math, teaching, or her students. She was probably just tired. Anyway, I didn’t understand why there were letters in my math book. It sounds comical now, but I think if she had just said, “that X is a placeholder. You are just trying to figure out what the actual number is” —I probably would have been ok. So simple. Instead, I spent the year NOT understanding and not asking questions and hiding the fact that I was lost. I didn’t want to stand out and I didn’t want to look stupid. I thought maybe I really was stupid and now everyone would know it. I learned just enough to get by and cheated on the rest in order to pass the class. Because my grades were decent no one noticed. The next year for algebra I had an even worse teacher. She was everything the 7th grade teacher was plus mean and scary. She was also the aunt of a popular cheerleader so you couldn’t even gossip about how awful she was!! Also, I had a crush on a very cute boy in that class and there was no way I wanted to look stupid in front of him!! More cheating, minimal learning and more feeling terrible about how “dumb” I was. Once again, I didn’t tell anyone that I was lost and my grades camouflaged my confusion. Meanwhile I was getting A’s in all my humanities classes and actually setting the curve in my science class. This was when the “I’m just not a math person” took root. The next year I started high school and took geometry. I decided ahead of time that I was tired of cheating and feeling dumb. My teacher wasn’t amazing, but I was determined to give it my very best effort. Guess what? I did very well!! I even liked proofs!! Geometry was great!! I thought my math problems were over. In 10th grade came algebra 2 and I was right back to being lost. I finally had a good teacher, but I was so disheartened to be lost again and I had so many holes in my basic understanding of algebra that despite her best efforts I felt really dumb. My pride would never let me explain to her how lost I was. I didn’t cheat this time and I barely pulled a C. I was embarrassed as I was a solid honor/AP student in everything else. I was relieved that my High School requirements let me stop taking math at that point and so that’s exactly what I did. I gave up. I graduated 11th in my class of over 400, but I did it believing math was my kryptonite. I went on to become a high school teacher, but I taught English. I’m now almost 50 and still avoid math.
I have heard so many variations on this story! They missed one thing — usually because their parents divorced or their grandparent died and they had a two to three week period where they were either absent or present without the ability to pay attention. They lost some key piece and never found it, and math was lost in general. You are not alone.
Yep, that was me too.
I think the saddest part is that it was so easy to sell myself short. To believe the trope “I’m just not a math person” and get virtually no pushback from anybody at the time. In the end, it made me a better, more compassionate teacher but it’s something I still think about and wonder “what if?”
"Losing a key piece and never finding it" sounds much like my experience with high school math -- though in my case, it was in large part, looking back on it from thirty-five-plus years later, because I was mentally checked-out of pretty much everything "school" my freshman and sophomore years and put myself in a hole that I was barely able to dig myself out of in time to graduate with my class. That and math was the subject in school (aside from P.E.) that I cared about the least to begin with.
I broke my back and was out of school for 5 weeks once in elementary school; had a very bad flu and was out for 3 weeks in about 6th grade...
Hey Holly, a math book sounds like a fantastic idea. Especially considering how bad some recent offerings like 'Mathish' have been.
I have a friend who works as a Maths text book editor for a publishing house. She's a great person adn I'm happy to put you in contact if you wish.
I appreciate the offer, but I’ve had good friends publish books with major publishers and I would rather be livestreamed skinning myself alive than go through a publisher, LOL.
Hahaha! I'm sure she would also counsel against publishing with her company, but she is passionate about maths education and if you think an experienced editor would be helpful I'll can reach out.
I would buy this book. The problem with a lot of the genius mathematics training privately available in the UK is that it’s very secretive. Schools pay providers of basic things like fractions training (I saw a guy using styrofoam cups but couldn’t work out how he used them from the short clip on TV) thousands of pounds per visit.
Advanced calc in college was a dividing line for me. I just couldn’t get it. I still think that maths is just naturally easy for some over others. But I also did well in a discrete math class taught by a grad student who proved to me this deficit can be overcome with quality instruction.
Based on my enjoyment of your essays, I would enjoy your math tome. My math aversion started with Euclidean Geometry, and my light switch moment occurred in midsummer school. Any new exposures like chemistry and Algebra II extinguish all self-confidence in this 70-year-old.
I miss your culture war takes. In my opinion, society needs more like yours because you brought nuances to your takes and they often made me think about things differently. Our society needs MORE of that even if you are unable to provide them. Of course it would be better if these nuanced conversations could happen in person.
That said, the first time I had a problem with math was college. Linear algebra and, to an extent, differential equations, kicked my ass. Not to mention matrix math. So I'm guessing I'm not the target of your proposed book.
My son is into stats, being a modern sports fan and all, so hopefully, that plays into it some. And while he loves logic, I think he's had some algebra issues and trig will challenge him a lot.
I miss writing them sometimes. But whatever tiny shred of doubt I had was erased by watching real, non-bot (yes, I checked) conservative accounts go at Kyle Rittenhouse and tell him they wished he'd been convicted so he could get fucked (they meant raped) like the bitch he is. That and what I saw on Substack Notes told me that the punishment for failing right-of-center purity tests is beyond what I am capable of suffering while remaining sane.
They love their rape fantasies. People are so vile.
Simple analytic geometry, for me, sadly. Plane geometry was great. And I was told that if I found analytic geometry hard, then trigonometry would be impossible. And I believed what I was told, in those days. Will buy your book when you self-publish. I hope there will be a physical version with a binding that allows it to lay open flat (with big margins!), along with the online, possibly interactive, version.
I don't know if this is the kind of feedback you're looking for, but when "Whole Word Reading" is described to me it sounds eerily familiar to how some of my math classes were taught. Algebra in particular.
My son is homeschooling himself when it comes to math. He just looks at it and numbers pop out of his mouth. Correct, well reasoned numbers. He's 10 and we're already in highschool geometry. My husband is like that. He's a PhD engineer. He can plot graph points in his head. I can't even add without fingers. I always loved the idea of math. But I dropped out of precalculus in highschool because failing was going to destroy my GPA and I'd lose any chances of getting a scholarship. I don't know what it is about the numbers but they squish around. They won't hold still and it all blurs and I can't see it anymore. I have to have paper, silence, and a calculator just to convert ratios for a recipe. I wish I was better at math. I love the idea of math. Physics was my favorite class in highschool. I remember the joy of solving the problems once I understood the equations. Every time I saw calculus or statistics on prerequisites for majors I would feel so sad. "You can't do that," echoed in my young mind. I wished I'd tried anyway. That was 30 years ago.
If you want to learn pre-calculus, and I think you would enjoy it (if you enjoyed physics, you'll love it) then this really is something you can do yourself. Khan Academy has a free precalculus course. I would suggest ordering a pre-calc textbook off Amazon and combining Khan Academy and Krista King (https://www.kristakingmath.com/). Your having enjoyed physics tells me that you would find learning precalculus deeply fulfilling and fun, and you'd be very proud of yourself, too.
Hi Holly, Thank you again for a thoughtful post. I am not sure how a math book would be helpful for me. My dad was a physicist who helped invent/create electron microscopes, and he could read an equation and visualize the form it described in his mind's eye. I need a more practical approach; a way to work with math in the real world where I can see and use equations. I read the first three of your articles on math and struggled through them. But I was a machinist for 30 years, and I kept a piece of paper with drawings of the pythagorean theory type stuff. In other words, formulas beside the shape they described. I would take it out to help me when a practical machining problem required me to have the right formula, and to know, for example, which surface on a part I was machining was represented by the "a," "b," or "c" of the formula. I made very few mistakes using this method over the years.
I'm not sure how a book could be written that would fit with whatever is that way of approaching math.