Maths

Celever

Celever

Wheeeee~
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(The title is the best question ever, right?)​

Hello there PokeBeach! I need a bit of help here. It's not the most personal question in the world, but even still...

So unfortunately I'm stuck with high expectations as far as academia is concerned. I always get the highest grades as far as wordy subjects are concerned without trying (and I'd honestly prefer it to not be that way) but any subjects to do with maths I get consistent Ds and Cs on, or, as with my latest end of year exams, straight up Fs. No matter how much I study or how much I revise for exams I get an awful mind block whenever I go into the exams and fail awfully, even if I know everything on the exams the day or even a couple hours before.

This is only really a concern for me because in Britain our Government forces all students to take 5 exams: English, Physics, Maths, Chemistry and Biology. English is my best subject alongside Philosophy so I'm cool with that (I actually tutor the mathematicians in my year about how to nail English exams) but Maths and the 3 sciences are literally just 4 maths exams, and you only get to take 10 exams total. To get into my school's 6th form I can only fail at 2 exams, because the school doesn't take your 2 worst grades into consideration. Everything else has to be As or A*s to get into the 6th form (unless there aren't enough people to make up a year in which case they allow some students who got one or MAYBE two Bs as well).

I guess it just comes down to I'm feeling the pressure to get good at maths already even though I've got about 2 years to do so and I need some tips to try and figure it out. There's really no reason why I should have trouble with Maths but I do, so if anyone has any tips or cheats to do with numbers I would really appreciate it.
 
King Arceus said:
What particular area(s) are you struggling with in math?
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It's pretty much everything, but I just thought that Maths is probably different around the world.

I'd say that probably the main areas would be shapes and stupidly complex formulas like n+g(fd)-uxh/4. That formula's made up, but it's pretty much what you find on tests. I can't remember any of them now though, even though I've probably revised all of the formulas for about 300 hours >_>.

I think it might be more tips for just remembering things like that. I can actually reorder that formula just fine, it's just when it tests you to recite random maths rules and such from memory as opposed to actually knowing methods. When things get complex I just can't retain it. My peak is pretty much pythagoras...

I don't really know, in Maths tests I just fail at parts of loads of different questions even if I should know the topics.
 
What might help you is trying to relate things to the real world; make numbers represent something. The brain is better able to maintain information when it has context to put with something. At work for eample, if I have to make a bale I need to log it. The number of digits each bale tag has is 10. I break the digits apart so things mean something. An example bale tag will look like 2012266215. I'll break it down as 2012, 2662, 15. 2012 representing a year the world was suppose to end according to some theories. 2662 is the middle and can be folded over itself. 15 because that's the last two numbers. As a result, every time I go to log it, I don't have to write down the number when I get to the computer, I can just recall it.

How do you study? Is the place quiet? Do you have background music playing? Do you study right after school or just before bed?
 
I know you've probably heard this before, but break it down.

As someone who's best subject is math, I feel the biggest struggle in math is getting "scared" of a problem--as in, an extremely complex formula can often look daunting, and it's hard to know exactly what you're supposed to even do with it. Nearly everything in math is a step-by-step process--so treat it as such. Identify a starting point (this is the most important part), then step 2, step 3, and so on. If you take the time to learn a given type of problem, the only hard part is identifying which step-by-step process you should be following, which comes with practice. Try to look at math problem as a sum of its parts, not as a whirlwind of symbols and numbers that seems impossible to work with.

Also, I've tutored other students in math, and the "mind block" as you describe it is pretty common. When you do practice problems, DO NOT look at the answer or any kind of study sheet until you've done as much as you can or finished the entire problem. If you try for a while, and still can't manage to get an answer, then and only then should you look at the answer, and try to figure out how to arrive at that answer before asking someone for help. This lets you understand exactly how to arrive at a given answer, and it sticks that step-by-step process in your mind so that you don't forget it on a test.

Last note: When you need to memorize a formula, try simply doing practice problems with the formula over and over again instead of actually memorizing it. This often will allow you to recall a formula much easier than if you had straight up memorized it. Of course, if you still can't seem to remember the formula without looking at it, then memorize it (noting that I consider memorizing stuff one of my best strengths, and I still avoid direct memorization when I can).
 
King Arceus said:
What might help you is trying to relate things to the real world; make numbers represent something. The brain is better able to maintain information when it has context to put with something. At work for eample, if I have to make a bale I need to log it. The number of digits each bale tag has is 10. I break the digits apart so things mean something. An example bale tag will look like 2012266215. I'll break it down as 2012, 2662, 15. 2012 representing a year the world was suppose to end according to some theories. 2662 is the middle and can be folded over itself. 15 because that's the last two numbers. As a result, every time I go to log it, I don't have to write down the number when I get to the computer, I can just recall it.

How do you study? Is the place quiet? Do you have background music playing? Do you study right after school or just before bed?
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That would make sense. Like the SohCahToa thing with trigonometry. However, for example, with circles I can remember the formula piD^2 where D = diameter but I haven't a clue what it actually solves. >_> Most of the time it is just not knowing the equations, though.

Usually I just do revision questions. Usually I also have YouTube on while I do them because otherwise I lose the will to live a little bit, since Maths is extremely boring. Usually I study after school as well. I'm usually busy doing duties online before bed because that's how the timezones work out.
Blah said:
I know you've probably heard this before, but break it down.

As someone who's best subject is math, I feel the biggest struggle in math is getting "scared" of a problem--as in, an extremely complex formula can often look daunting, and it's hard to know exactly what you're supposed to even do with it. Nearly everything in math is a step-by-step process--so treat it as such. Identify a starting point (this is the most important part), then step 2, step 3, and so on. If you take the time to learn a given type of problem, the only hard part is identifying which step-by-step process you should be following, which comes with practice. Try to look at math problem as a sum of its parts, not as a whirlwind of symbols and numbers that seems impossible to work with.

Also, I've tutored other students in math, and the "mind block" as you describe it is pretty common. When you do practice problems, DO NOT look at the answer or any kind of study sheet until you've done as much as you can or finished the entire problem. If you try for a while, and still can't manage to get an answer, then and only then should you look at the answer, and try to figure out how to arrive at that answer before asking someone for help. This lets you understand exactly how to arrive at a given answer, and it sticks that step-by-step process in your mind so that you don't forget it on a test.

Last note: When you need to memorize a formula, try simply doing practice problems with the formula over and over again instead of actually memorizing it. This often will allow you to recall a formula much easier than if you had straight up memorized it. Of course, if you still can't seem to remember the formula without looking at it, then memorize it (noting that I consider memorizing stuff one of my best strengths, and I still avoid direct memorization when I can).
Click to expand...
Hmm... This makes sense. Sometimes when I see a question I pretty much think "welp, can't answer that" and I guess that's why I draw a blank. Interesting n~n.

I guess Maths is kind of a mindset like the whole step by step thing.

Thanks to both of you, I'll definitely use your advice! :]
 
What I'd recommend listening to is music without words while studying. If you listen to music with words, particularly if its a song you know, your brain will be more distracted by the lyrics of the song. I know this from experience of trying to program while listening to music.

Try studying before bed instead if you can. Things that happen just before going to bed will be more remembered by the brain. If you've ever been yelled at shortly before going to bed, you'll probably remember a lot of exact words that were used and emotions that were going through you at the time.
 
I would say the first thing is stop calling it a "formula". Since you like philosophy, which is basically the "thinking" subject out of all, think about equations instead of formulas.

The reason I'm saying this is that, just like philosophy, math is about thinking, reflecting over something, so when you call it a formula it sounds too closed, like as if someone woke up one day and decided to write a bunch of letters down with numbers. That's not how it works, every equation has logical thinking behind it, a way to get to them from simpler assumptions.

Other than that, I advise you to not panic trying to remember things. Part of studying is knowing what that equation represents, why is it like that and how it got discovered :) When things have a real meaning it makes learning easier, instead of just reading that "2*pi*r is the circumference length".
 
^ I'd like to qualify that by mentioning that if for some reason you really cannot understand a given concept/equation/formula (which will happen as you move into stuff like calculus), you should memorize what you need to know and move on, making sure to do a lot of practice problems with that topic. Sometimes, a concept won't make any intuitive sense until you've used it 50 times. There will be topics that won't make any sense on a textbook page but will become crystal clear as you work with them.
 
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