Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017) • Hacker News Board

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#81

Post by starik36 » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:13 AM UTC

Personal experience. In USSR till 16, then 11th and 12th grade in US. Yes, the books and the curriculum were way harder in the Soviet Union, but it's largely pointless.

In USSR, there were 2-3 kids in the entire class who actually vaguely understood the material and the other 28 were just copying their homework.

In a US high school, by contrast, you can choose to take whatever level of math you are able to grok (AP, College Prep, etc...)

Given the average results, I vastly prefer the US system. USSR system was a one size fits all that didn't work well for the average pupil.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#82

Post by Endlessly » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:13 AM UTC

c-smile wrote: post #67

I was comparing my math books (from Soviet university, Physics and Applied Math) and my son's from Canadian university (CS). Huge difference to be honest. Canadian ones (same as in US I think) were more like belletristic texts written with the goal to give basics without too much thought needed by the reader. In contrast you cannot approach Soviet text math book without serious thinking effort. You need to overcome s…

Read, then reread, and still do not understand your point.

Are you saying that in Russia, since the education was free that the goal of the textbooks was to make it hard to want to stay in school, if so, to me, seems like it’s unlikely, but possible.

Putting aside non-Russian textbooks, what are you saying the intended reasoning of the textbook form was as it relates to Russian culture?

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#83

Post by strategarius » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:13 AM UTC

dang wrote: post #21

droithomme wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Ok, that's enough now. Since you clearly don't want to use HN as intended, I've banned this account.

It's naive to think that Russian, Chinese and just fat trolls do not use HN as a resource for work and entertainment. Some entrance filter is required.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#84

Post by google234123 » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:14 AM UTC

parthdesai wrote: post #57

google234123 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe you that Soviet body builders only used free weights. https://www.rbth.com/history/329827-bodybuilding-outlawed-in...

If you believe it's only Soviet body builders who took steroids, you're in for a rude awakening.

When did I say that?

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#85

Post by p1esk » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:14 AM UTC

throw1234651234 wrote: post #75

p1esk wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, learning math was never more important to an average Russian than it was to an average American. An average Russian has never knew math any better than an average American. Source: attended school in both countries.

Are you in your early, early 20s? Because the Russian education system fell apart recently. Bribes and teachers moving to Europe and all that.

No, I learned the multiplication table back in 1985.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#86

Post by eigenvector » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:14 AM UTC

c-smile wrote: post #67

I was comparing my math books (from Soviet university, Physics and Applied Math) and my son's from Canadian university (CS). Huge difference to be honest. Canadian ones (same as in US I think) were more like belletristic texts written with the goal to give basics without too much thought needed by the reader. In contrast you cannot approach Soviet text math book without serious thinking effort. You need to overcome s…

In Canadian universities you typically have 3 to 5 levels of mathematics courses for students specializing in something other than math. The highest level of rigour would only be found in the courses for mathematicians, with physics, engineering and computer science students studying many of the same concepts but less rigorously and with comparatively little attention to deriving results from first principles. Was the approach the same in the USSR?

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#87

Post by madengr » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:14 AM UTC

jschwartzi wrote: post #29

downerending wrote: post #7

In a US college in the 80s, the math professors definitely seemed to be in awe of the Russians when it came to this stuff. And though I was in the US, early on I was in an utter hardware wasteland, and I do think that not having much hardware access improved my ability to just sit and think about things with pencil and paper.

Similarly, working on products with no debugger and a single LED for a UI meant that I had to reason very carefully about how the code I wrote worked. If I made a mistake there would be no feedback other than the behavior of the product.

Funny, that’s how I presently program microcontrollers.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#88

Post by Retric » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:15 AM UTC

c-smile wrote: post #67

I was comparing my math books (from Soviet university, Physics and Applied Math) and my son's from Canadian university (CS). Huge difference to be honest. Canadian ones (same as in US I think) were more like belletristic texts written with the goal to give basics without too much thought needed by the reader. In contrast you cannot approach Soviet text math book without serious thinking effort. You need to overcome s…

IMO, the point of textbooks is to educate people on some topic so making them as easy as possible seems like the correct choice. Outside of competitions, the value most people get from those courses is what them remember in 5+ years when their working not really the kind of symbol manipulation that makes can make things opaque.

That said, soviet style education produced a lot of great mathematicians especially relative to population sizes. But it’s not clear to me if that’s an outgrowth of better education or economic forces.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#89

Post by wonnage » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:15 AM UTC

jimmaswell wrote: post #64

chii wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It was very operational, you calculate, you manipulate concrete data it's interesting that some academic approaches focus on the theoretical framework and conceptual depth, with the underlying assumption that the student would "get" it once the fundamentals are understood. The other approach, mostly in the asian schools, teach rote and speed in mechanical/mental manipulation. For example, a student would do 1000 qu…

The rote learner learned nothing more than the ability to regurgitate a mechanical process while the academic learner learned understanding, in my view. You have to work through some examples to solidify it but that should be totally secondary to understanding the meaning and concepts. Like a physics teacher of mine put it, rote math learning is like teaching sea lions to honk horns for fish - students give the right…

Everyone can learn to solve equations quickly if they’re forced to do it 1000 times. They might forget it the day after the test, the might not know why they’re doing anything, but you can be damn certain you know what you’re doing if just for that brief window in time.

It’s also clear if you’re succeeding or failing. I’ve noticed that private school parents in the US seem to hate homework. The kids get three optional problems a week and no tests. All the time that they might’ve spent thinking on their own about problems is instead spent in class, which really limits how much new stuff can be taught. The kids think they know everything because there are no grades. The kids that actually perform at grade level have private tutors giving them homework, while the rest are just playing fortnite and unable to do fractions.

Re: Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017)

#90

Post by c-smile » Wed, Apr 22, 2020, 3:15 AM UTC

smohare wrote: post #73

c-smile wrote: post #67

I was comparing my math books (from Soviet university, Physics and Applied Math) and my son's from Canadian university (CS). Huge difference to be honest. Canadian ones (same as in US I think) were more like belletristic texts written with the goal to give basics without too much thought needed by the reader. In contrast you cannot approach Soviet text math book without serious thinking effort. You need to overcome s…

Or perhaps the “hardcore” texts are just poorly written?

Yeah, that's what I said, "poorly written" is a criteria that can be applied to belletristic more than to science text books.

Russian math books have just few words, formulas are the rest. What can be poorly written there?

Kidding :)