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Don't force your kids to do math

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Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#181

Post by Loic »

rerdavies wrote: post #166
laurent_du wrote: post #102

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 sto…

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…

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).

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#182

Post by mschuster91 »

raverbashing wrote: post #97
sublinear wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> 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

> 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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#183

Post by ho_schi »

hilbert42 wrote: post #171
kleene_op wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

"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 ev…

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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#184

Post by tetris11 »

tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: post #134
laurent_du wrote: post #102

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 sto…

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?)

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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#185

Post by Hojojo »

Der_Einzige wrote: post #14
codemac wrote: post #8

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 progr…

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 w…

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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#186

Post by agnishom »

hahamaster wrote: post #43

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 "whe…

> 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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#187

Post by cpursley »

rerdavies wrote: post #166
laurent_du wrote: post #102

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 sto…

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…

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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#188

Post by Viliam1234 »

maccard wrote: post #154
laurent_du wrote: post #102

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 sto…

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.

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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#189

Post by dandanua »

laurent_du wrote: post #102

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 sto…

> 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.

Re: Don't force your kids to do math

#190

Post by imtringued »

QuadmasterXLII wrote: post #100
somenameforme wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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

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.

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