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Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

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Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#131

Post by SoftTalker »

misterpurple45 wrote: post #62

I’m in a very similar position. I didn’t go to uni and somehow found myself in a programming career. In a few weeks I’ll be sitting A-level (UK advanced high school) Mathematics exams for the same reasons as you. I’m 32 years old. I’ve found having formal exams to study for very motivating, and humbling. I thought I knew things I’d read in books, but it turns out I just recognised them when I came across the same top…

There are no standardized high-school exams in the USA. The closest things would be SAT/ACT which are taken by college-bound high school students, but they are separate from high school and have zero bearing on graduating from high school.

I don't know of any reason an older person could not take the SAT but also most older students interested in going to university would be admitted under different critera than a 17 year old, and high school grades and SAT might not be relevant at all for someone in his 30s or older.

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#132

Post by rg111 »

rmonvfer wrote: post #126
rg111 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was an A+ student up to Sophomore year in HS. I downgraded to A or B+ student after I knew how much fun actual learning is. Before that, all I was doing was memorizing and practising heuristics to get A+. I actually started learning Science since 11th grade. I grew and grew. And my scores tanked. Got only 6.xx/10 in college as well. But no regrets. Learning Math properly gave me a super solid foundation to learn De…

This, 100%. I couldn’t agree more. I’m currently a Software Engineering undergrad in Europe and, at least by my personal experience, the whole education system just focuses on preparing people to pass an exam, not to properly learn a subject. IMHO, the problem starts when the students get used to memorizing and repeating sample exercises which involve 0 creativity and then graduate and get an actual job.

What I said shouldn’t really be taken as an advice.

If you think that getting good scores will open doors for you, and you are in need of those, then, by all means, work hard to get good scores.

What many people like me do not realize is that learning something properly is among the material luxuries. You can only afford to do this if you do not have socio-economic disadvantages (like most people need jobs straight out of college- mostly for the money, but social norm is also a factor).

I am a person of simpler needs and I do not care about socio-economic norms. You might not be like me.

So, sticking to social design might achieve you benefits.

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#133

Post by oneoff786 »

What machine learning? For what use case? Hot take, you probably don’t need to know the math. It’s mildly illuminating to derive that the MLE of a Gaussian distribution is the mean, but it’s also irrelevant to solving problems. Statistical reasoning is important. Being able to think about things in terms of vector spaces is good. But do I really use calculus or linear algebra much as a data scientist? No. Basically never.

It’s way more impactful to say… visually and manually make a decision Tree on a 2D scatter plot of data points to grok the algorithm.

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#134

Post by BigHatLogan »

zerohp wrote: post #28

I was a C student in high school. I never took a math class beyond basic algebra. I started from Khan Academy's first exercise when I was 33 years old. It seems silly looking back that I was solving problems on the number line as an adult. At that time, around 10 years ago, Khan Academy had excellent coverage through trigonometry and single variable calculus. Once I reached that point I went to my local community col…

Wonderful story--thanks for sharing! I love stories like this.

Maybe off-topic: But did you run into any difficulties landing your first job after finishing your MS in EE? I'm tempted to pursue something similar, but I worry about ageism and other factors when going into the job marketplace at that age in a brand new field. Would love to hear more about your experience.

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#135

Post by aksss »

methusala8 wrote: post #43
ImaCake wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It seems silly looking back that I was solving problems on the number line as an adult. I study biostatistics and dabble in population genetics research. I still resort to number lines and venn diagrams frequently. There is a reason we teach number lines - they are very useful!

Where exactly do you use number line? Thanks.

I don’t recall ever learning number lines in school. Was in eighties. Are number lines a new teaching tool or am I just not remembering this?

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#136

Post by Perez418 »

rg111 wrote: post #56
zerohp wrote: post #28

I was a C student in high school. I never took a math class beyond basic algebra. I started from Khan Academy's first exercise when I was 33 years old. It seems silly looking back that I was solving problems on the number line as an adult. At that time, around 10 years ago, Khan Academy had excellent coverage through trigonometry and single variable calculus. Once I reached that point I went to my local community col…

I was an A+ student up to Sophomore year in HS. I downgraded to A or B+ student after I knew how much fun actual learning is. Before that, all I was doing was memorizing and practising heuristics to get A+. I actually started learning Science since 11th grade. I grew and grew. And my scores tanked. Got only 6.xx/10 in college as well. But no regrets. Learning Math properly gave me a super solid foundation to learn De…

I would love to chat sometime if you’re available. I’ve been teaching middle school math for the past 6 years. I’m now trying to transition into tech.

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#137

Post by panda888888 »

I prefer traditional textbooks, so I've always been turned off by suggestions to use Kahn Academy. My preferred math resource is OpenStax, an open-source textbook publisher. The books only go up through calc 3, so if you're beyond that level, you will need to find a different resource.

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#138

Post by 0x20cowboy »

YMMV and I am not paid to do ML, but diving deep into 3D game programming forced me to learn quite a bit about linear algebra which is useful for ML.

I found it very useful having visual uses that solved actual problems instead of just theoretical uses (or the old “trust me this’ll be important later”). For example, trying to figure out how light would bounce of an object put me down the vector, normal and dot product path (http://learnwebgl.brown37.net/09_lights/lights_diffuse.html)

After building a custom play around game engine, I can actually have discussions the ML people at work and I have a rudimentary understanding of what they are talking about.

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#139

Post by jamestimmins »

panda888888 wrote: post #137

I prefer traditional textbooks, so I've always been turned off by suggestions to use Kahn Academy. My preferred math resource is OpenStax, an open-source textbook publisher. The books only go up through calc 3, so if you're beyond that level, you will need to find a different resource.

I generally agree, as videos tend to take a long time to convey information. Have you actually worked through the OpenStax books?

Re: Ask HN: How to learn math from zero for adults?

#140

Post by 2snakes »

wonnage wrote: post #128
Viliam1234 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> From a scientific perspective, this is absolutely the wrong advice. Those are unnecessarily harsh words. You and elliekelly are not contradicting each other, but talking about different things. If you didn't understand chapters 1 and 2 from a textbook, reading chapter 3 from the same book is usually a BAD idea. Sadly, this is what formal education often tells you to do, because it follows a predetermined schedule.…

I personally have always had a hard time inhaling chapters of a textbook sequentially. It’s often easier to skim it first, attempt the problem set, and then go back when you get stuck. Forces you into a more active mode of looking for particular information instead of just trying to absorb everything. The same works for the humanities too, once my attention starts waning I’ll start skimming and rewind when necessary.…

This is also known as order control in inquiry-based learning.
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