Tips for improving my math/algebra/etc skills?

[smartdude1212]

Originally Posted by Reincarnate

I honestly blame teachers for much of this because most teachers are shitty empaths / communicators. The challenge is explaining something in a way that is sensitive to the student's state of mind.

I feel as if this especially applies to university professors, who can be so learned in their subject that every elementary problem seems easy to them. I have a few professors who are excellent at assuming that I know how to start a problem, and that my issues just arise in the process of solving said problem. In reality, sometimes I just plain don't know where to begin. It can also be intimidating when they ask "okay, how far did you get with the problem?" and I respond with "nowhere," and this can turn me off from asking them anything until I make progress.

One skill that isn't taught at all (or at least not well) is how to ask the right questions. Determining what your goal is / what you want to solve and what you need to know to get there, and how you can break each one of those problems down.

Also very true. Even during a lecture a professor may say "are there any questions/issues?" and get no response, but if I'm confused about something that has just been taught, it can be especially difficult to phrase the question within five seconds before they move on to something else.

I'm of the mind that something is only hard when it's taught poorly. A lot of people find statistics really hard, for example, but that's because *everyone sucks at statistics*. Things become much easier when you have a good teacher.

I blame my dislike for statistics on having a sub-par statistics professor.

Interestingly enough, I have two incredibly difficult classes this semester. One is difficult because of the professor (second course in complex analysis ugh) and the prior knowledge that is assumed, while the other is difficult simply because of the material (algebraic graph theory, yowza). In fact, I'm fairly sure I'd be failing algebraic graph theory if it were taught by a different professor, because the one that I have now understands the difficulties that students have. Shocking!