Two plus two equals tears

Math sucks. I don’t like it at all. A few weeks ago, someone said, “You’re not very good at math, are you?” All I could think to say was, “Hmm, what gave me away? The fact I am an English major, or that I need my fingers to do simple addition?”

I couldn’t even go to my parents for help because they did not understand how our teachers taught us how to problem-solve. It felt like the scene from “Incredibles 2” where the dad said, “I don’t know that way, why would they change math? Math is math!” A lot of times I just ended up saying I understood what my parents told me then walked away texting my friends for the answers.

I used to think I was pretty good at math; I was able to do all the processes and PEMDAS. Then high school hit me with the quadratic formula, imaginary numbers and polynomials. I barely passed college algebra and I was very thankful I would never have to take another math class.

Math is a very hard class to take and to teach. With math, there is a right answer and a wrong answer. Not to mention, most schools are concerned about learning quickly, taking a test, getting a good grade and moving to the next thing. If a few students are having trouble with a topic, but the majority understands, the class moves on. When you don’t understand something, it’s hard to move on to a harder, more complicated version of the problem. After all, the teachers did say something about having a firm foundation to build off of.

I don’t like math. I don’t think the math classes I had to take in high school prepared me for what I intended to do in college. I think it would have been better if I were able to take simpler classes to teach me how to do my taxes. Those classes would have been worth more to me.

At this point, I am intimidated by math and hope to never come across it again. I feel like a lot of people have similar thoughts. I think a lot of people lose interest in math. It’s hard to stick with something difficult that you don’t understand.

I suppose learning about writing and literature isn’t at the top of everyone’s career plans, but people who are good at math and are going into some sort of mathematical career impress me. How you can understand all the graphs and imaginary numbers is impressive.