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"I Don't Like to Read"

This is something many of my high school students told me. "I just can't seem to enjoy reading books. It's just slow and useless. I can learn the same thing from a Youtube video in half the time", they'd say unabashedly.

They are not exactly wrong. Video sites such as Youtube, Skillshare, or even online courses, are great places to learn many knowledge and skills. Videos are more captivating than texts and can explain any topic with more clarity and efficiency. In the age where speed and efficiency dominates all things we do, reading has thus become this outdated activity that seems burdensome and inefficient. To gain a better understanding of what exactly my students dislike about reading, I listened closely to their complaints and gathered the following points. I will try to describe each problem in the way the struggling reader explains it, and attempt to address these problems in another blog post.

1. I read too slowly for reading to be entertaining

I can't seem to read faster without misunderstanding things. But the slower I read, the more boring it is. If I have to take 2 hours to finish reading a simple story, it's just not that exciting. But if I force myself to read faster, it gives me anxiety, like I need to rush through something.

2. The books/subjects we have to read about are boring

Everything we read for class is boring. I mean everything. English class, history class, science class. We never get to choose the subjects we want to read about. Like I kind of wanted to read this psych book, but I don't get to. Because in English, we only read fiction novels. I just don't see what's so interesting about Holden Caufield.

3. I don't have the patience nor time to finish any books

I've never finished a single school book. I don't want to spend hours trying to do something that boring. Say a story intrigues me, I don't have the patience to read through two hundred pages to get to the ending. Just tell me already.

4. I zone out after 2 minutes

I don't know why, sometimes I just zone out. The language is too dense or something. I can't even finish a sentence without zoning out if the sentence is long. And then I'd reread it. Sometimes that would go on for paragraphs, and then I find out I didn't actually READ the paragraphs.

5. I don't understand many of the sentences/vocabularies

Some authors write in such a weird language that I don't understand any of it. It's like I'm reading a totally different language. Why do I have to learn a new language everytime I gotta read a book? It's just annoying. And some books also use really long sentences and hard vocabulary. I've never seen or heard those words in real life. So where do they get those from?

6. Just words and no image makes books dry

Books just put me off. Seeing lines and lines of nothing but text, I just don't even want to start reading it. Telling a story without image or visuals just makes it hard for the story to make an impression!

7. Some books have really long and useless descriptions

Some authors are crazy. They would write about a street for three whole pages. Then they go on to write about the main character's coat for another two pages. What is the point?! Who cares about the details of the coat's trim or whatever? They slow down the story and are boring as hell. If there was an image, they wouldn't even need 3 words to describe it.

8. Books are just not dramatic enough for some stories

Books are just a bad way to tell a story. Some stories needs to move fast. Like an action movie. Why would you read all the actions in words? Unless if you want to watch the whole thing in ultra slow motion. It just sucks out all the excitement.

9. Some of the stories are just not relatable to our lives

We are always reading about some story from a hundred, or even two hundred years ago! I get that we're supposed to see their world, but it's just so unrelatable. Everything they live through has no relation to our world today. Some of their problems we would just never face in our world. Like who still needs to look for their old friend by writing letters? You can video chant anyone on earth nowadays. It's just hard to find these stories relatable or interesting.

10. Books take a long time to explain something simple

I mean books are just not efficient at explaining something. Youtube probably taught me 90 percent of everything I needed to learn, for school or outside of school. And I learn much better with Youtube.

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The Academic Self-fulfilling Prophecy

I’ll probably forget all of it by tomorrow.

This is what Reo said when he finally understood a basic calculus concept. Just a few seconds earlier, he answered the question correctly, saying with relative confidence “this isn’t even that hard.” I was glad that he finally felt empowered against his long-term enemy - Calculus. But how could he say a second later that he’d forget it all by tomorrow? If the concept “isn’t even that hard”, how could he forget it? And why is he certain about it? While baffling, these questions are important to think about, and may lead to better understanding of the default mindset for a struggling learner. And it’s imperative for us to help students become aware of and navigate these psychological pitfalls. Because if a student thinks “he will forget something by tomorrow”, he is probably right. 

I have seen it many times before, as a tutor, a teacher, or as a friend. Students who are confident about learning, who tell themselves they can learn well, end up learning well. On the other hand, students who tell themselves they will fail, for whatever reason, end up just as they expected. It’s basic psychology: what we believe of ourselves becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. And this type of self-fulfilling prophecy can happen anywhere, at work, in schools, or in life. If you think you’re strong enough to pull through a challenge, then you’re right. In the classroom, where most tasks can be challenging, the “can-do” mindset becomes crucial. Before the student even gets to tackle the real problem, he needs to have the courage and the mental strength to face it. If he gets into the habit of “I won’t succeed”, not only will he fail, he will grow to despise learning as something he will certainly fail at, and the self fulfilling prophecy will continue.

Thus, the most important thing they should learn is to stand fearless in front of academic challenges, to say “I will do better”, or “I won’t fail again”. 

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Getting Kids Excited About Learning - 4

Yesterday I stumbled upon a TED video that blew my mind. It answers one of the questions that has always puzzled me about work, learning, and motivation. 

Shawn Anchor, a positive psychologist researching at Harvard, demonstrates in a funny 10 minute video a clear link between happiness and brain performance. The figures were assertively evident: people learn and perform at a much higher level when they’re at a positive emotional state compared to a neutral or negative one. Energy, creativity, efficiency, focus, everything is boosted when a person is in a happy state. And this was what he called the “happiness advantage.” 

If it was obvious that successful people love their work, or successful students love learning, few of us are bold enough to flip the equation to postulate that people have higher chances of success if they start from a happy state. This makes a lot of common sense, since we know how stress can negatively impact our brain, our energy, and hamper any growth or breakthrough. We also see it in our daily lives, that those who reach success seems to always radiate an innate sense of energy and joy. Now that this secret is so clearly spelled-out by science, we have no excuse not to apply it and improve our work and learning. 

When it comes to students in classrooms, the importance of this emotional factor is even more salient. Children or teenagers, usually less apt to handle various emotional states, are more likely to allow their emotions to determine their ability to learn or perform academically. In addition, their first response to learning may not be an objective judgment of the subject, but a emotional response to it. “I can’t do Math, because I hate Math class, because it makes me miserable” could be the logic for a student. This is also why students who love a teacher tend to do better in his/her class. This could even explain why students from stable families, who are socially secure, perform better academically than those who are not. At least partly, the reason is because they start from a positive or stable emotional state.

This conclusion has enormous implications about school and academic learning in general. It puts at the forefront the question of the psychological happiness of the learner before any learning activity. What teachers and educators must consider, even before teaching methods and knowledge content, is how to foster a general atmosphere of joy, friendliness, and peace. 

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A Culture of Learning - Teachers 2

I’m sitting at a cafe underneath a big skyscraper near the business area of the city. Businessmen and employees of various well-known companies are streaming in and out with coffee in hand. At the table next to mine, a couple of young men are engaged in heated discussion about a character design. I figured they work for the famous gaming company that has its name atop this building. They seem completely engrossed in the animation of their discussion, debating about some kind of armor motion on a character. I can’t help but overhear their discussion and be moved by their energy, and I found myself wondering: what if teachers are just as heated in discussion about a class they’re teaching or an extracurricular activity they’re planning? What if they spent most of their time thinking and discussing about improving their craft or researching their subjects? To me, the profession of teaching is one of deep passion and dedication, not any less than the profession of a designer or a scientist. Ideally, teachers should have chosen their career for their love of people and of learning. But reality seems to be very different. Many teachers can’t care less about their subject or about learning. Their dispassion for knowledge shows through their lethargic teaching and their dull classes. How can such teachers possibly inspire passion in their students? And how can we change this? 

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What if teachers are just as heated in discussion about a class they’re teaching or an extracurricular activity they’re planning? I always thought that the profession of teaching is one of deep passion and dedication, not any less than the profession of a designer or a scientist.

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A Culture of Learning - Teachers

As adults that students come into contact with the most at school, teachers represent the adults in society at large. Students find in the actions of their teachers a preview of the society they are walking into, and the kind of adults they want to become. That’s why it’s so important for teachers to be exemplary adults - whatever action they exhibit, students will see them and invariably copy them on occasions. So, if we want to build a culture of learning in our schools, we first need our teachers to be model figures of learning. They need to show students how learning is done and what a life of learning means. This turns the traditional idea of a teacher on its head. Instead of focusing on the activity of instructing, they also need to exemplify the act of learning. English teachers should read more, write more in the presence of students. Science teachers can get hands on with experiments. More than being good instructors, they need to be good scholars themselves. And it’s not just a show in front of the students - whatever learning teachers do on their own time will invariably show through their interactions with students. Teachers who are scholars will infallibly exemplify qualities of curiosity, humility, focus, patience, and passion for learning. Students will discern those qualities just as quickly as they’ll discern a lazy, pedantic, charlatan. 

I remember from my college years, a professor whom I would always see reading a book on a bench at the park near campus. She didn’t seem to care for much else, wearing the same black cardigan everywhere she went, but her passion for French literature shone through everything else superficial about her. I looked up to her as a teacher, not only because she inspired me to read more, but also because she brought to life the figure of a dedicated scholar. We’ve all had teachers who love the subject they’re teaching so much that their life seems to be dedicated to it. Whether it’s the band teacher who goes to every symphonic event in the city, or the literature teacher who sheds tears reading a passage in front of a class. There is nothing that motivates students to learn, that fuels the curiosity for subject, more than a teacher who gives oneself completely to their subjects. Those are the kinds of teachers we want in our schools.

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How Schools Can Create a Culture of Learning

In the previous entry, we talked about why it’s so important for the American public school to take the lead in building the culture of learning. Schools need to define education and learning in the right way, to set rigorous standards for their students, and to establish learning environments on their campuses. So what are some ways schools can do that? Here are some ideas that I think schools should do more of. 

Defining Learning 

A school needs to have a clear definition of what quality education means. What does it mean to be an educated person? What are the values our students should embody? How should learning and teaching be done at our school? This definition needs to stand as the central philosophy of the school, driving important decisions from curriculum design to teacher selection, from parent-school relations to after-school programs. Teachers, staff, and leaders of the school need to educate and act according to this definition. Students and parents should understand it well. Students should also be encouraged to come up with their own definition of education. What kind of things do they want to learn? How does education change themselves? These kinds of questions should be posed, and the concept of learning should be constantly on their minds. School is a temporary stage in their lives, but the idea of learning should stay with them for much longer. For they will need it as they take on all sorts of future learnings and improvements in their lives. 

Rigorous Standards 

Increasing the rigor and standard in learning is key to producing better learning results. It is by demanding higher standards from its faculty and students, that they will be urged to reach there. At a lower standard, most students don’t feel the importance nor the pressing need for learning, not to mention those who are bored by the learning. At a lower standard, unqualified teachers can also get by with mediocre performance. This culture of content and mediocrity runs against the pursuit of excellence that is essential to a culture of learning. But by injecting more rigor into the system, including academic and after-school curriculums, a school is also telling students to aim higher. Doing so, a school can not only highlight the end-goal of quality learning, but it also displays a deep trust and confidence in its students and faculty. 

Other ways to build a culture of learning 

By creating more opportunities for a variety of learning to occur outside the classroom, for example in extra-curricular activities, field-trips, events or competitions … 

By focusing student attention on learning, by eliminating programs that don’t encourage learning

By holding events during the school year that celebrate learning 

By allocating periods of free-time in student schedules where they are autonomous in choosing their own form of learning

By setting clear examples of learning (staff, faculty, and leadership), and by recognizing students or faculty who are good learners in any field 

By creating student leadership positions based on learning, for example class representatives in Science, Art, Physical Education, English, Math etc.   

By regularly discussing the topic of learning at parent-teacher conferences

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Culture of Learning

It’s always been a mystery to me why some cultures place immense importance on education while others don’t. Growing up in a traditional Asian family, I know what it feels like to have parents who obsess about education. It feels like choosing neighborhoods to live based on school districts; it feels like endless discussions around books, reading, and grades; it feels like the proud yet heavy joy of going to an elite college, because you’ve been accepted, and because your parents are willing to sacrifice thousands of savings for you to go there. 

I was lucky enough that my internal motivation aligned with my parents’ wishes - I was a child who enjoyed academic learning and wanted to do well in school. Yet I am not blind to the many around me to whom their parents’ nagging sounded, at best, like background noise. After all, few kids grow up enjoying doing hard work for good grades at school. Even fewer have the innate discipline and focus that our academic system demands. Who would prefer TV or video games to doing homework?! 

Looking back, I do not agree with the forceful ways of strict Asian parents. All the while, I cannot deny all of the advantages I’ve gained from the years of disciplined learning and the appreciation of education that my parents fostered in me. While my own academic viewpoints veer towards naturalism, I have to agree that it is the duty of parents, teachers, and our society to teach every young person about the importance of education. This ceaseless emphasis on education in the private and public sphere is the one factor that differentiates the countries whose kids treat school and learning seriously and from other countries. 

It’s hardly disputable that kids and adolescents need to be reminded of the importance of learning by adults around them - support from teachers or a nudge from parents. Discipline and motivation do not come easily to beginning learners. Of course, when I say “a nudge”, I mean a gentle, nonobtrusive reminder. The goal is to help students realize the importance of education, and not to coerce or force kids into doing things they despise (this is where many East Asian cultures make their mistakes). Ultimately, motivation needs to come from within. Students themselves should feel a desire to learn. But how do we develop those intrinsic motivations in kids? That is where their environment comes to play. Whether it's adults they look up to, or the popular culture they consume, if we want to raise a generation of young scholars, we all have a role to play in emphasizing the importance of learning.

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Getting Kids Excited About Learning - Part 2

I can think of a few instances in my own academic years where teachers gave students freedom in class. The first time this happened was in the first grade of elementary school in China. On certain days of the week, we had “self-study classes” at the end of our day where students are given an entire class period to work on whichever subject they prefer. For example, some would work on Math or Chinese homework of the day, some would review for the imminent English test. The teacher would watch over the class to ensure order and silence but as long as you keep quiet, you could do any sort of studying you like. Most of the students preferred this period because they could choose to spend more time on the subject they were weak in. It was also easy to focus because everyone around you was focusing and studying. Of course there would be occasional disturbances to the silence as students tries to talk or socialize covertly, but the teacher is usually pretty strict about maintaining silence. In general, the ambiance felt like a cozy, calm library room where students are trusted to do their independent work. 

My 8th grade English teacher did something similar. At the beginning of each class, she always gave us 20 minutes to do any reading we like, as long as we did not disrupt others. My friend and I were big nerds and always chose to read history books. Other kids chose to read novels or history books. Still a few others chose to doze off behind their books. The teacher would read in the front of the class, showing us an example of good behavior, and giving us minimal supervision. In her infinite wisdom, she did not occupy herself with the few students who were not reading. I thought the idea was ingenious. By “giving us free reading time”, by not forcing us to read certain books, we felt more autonomous in making the decision to read. And once we made our decision to pick up the book, we are held more responsible for actually paying attention our reading. The ambiance was also very nice. For once, our noisy, disorganized class would turn into a quiet and solemn class full of readers. Not only did it teach us to read more, but also to see reading as a peaceful and respectable activity.  

In my senior year of college, I was fortunate enough to have Professor H as my writing professor. His classes followed this organic and almost desultory path, away from any curriculum or guidelines. The class “Business Writing”, but he talked about whatever he felt like in class, from astrology to art, from business to herbology, and then gave us loosely-related assignments. He also gave us plenty of time to talk amongst ourselves, always arriving a few minutes late and always putting us in small discussion groups. Our assignments were also radically unbound by rules. More than just completing assignments, he wanted us to have personal interest and passion in everything we did. One of our assignments was to describe an idea of a creative start-up project, and it really could be anything our entrepreneurial minds could come up with. In-class “free-writing” was also his signature - a time where we could write about whatever we want. These writings are never graded or looked over a second-time, and we were to write without any judgment. For the first time, I felt excitement and joy when putting down words. And It was the activity that awakened my interest in writing and helped me continue to write to this day.

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Getting Kids Excited About Learning - Part 1

I can’t stop thinking about something my friend said the other night: “I just want to get kids excited about learning, I think that’s the only thing teachers need to do.” I couldn’t agree with him more! Nowadays, everyone can find any knowledge they want on the internet. Passing on specific knowledge is no longer the most important job for teachers. Rather, sparking that interest in kids to take their curiosity one step further into learning has become a crucial part of their job. Over these few days, I’ve gotten very excited about the prospect of getting kids excited about learning. And this is related to what I have been writing about on the Culture of Learning. How can we revive students’ natural interest in learning? And how can we build a culture of learning in our schools, where curiosity and learning are celebrated by teachers and students alike? 

The first idea that popped into my head is to give kids freedom. When I think of our current education system, I think of constraints and control. Kids are always following the teacher’s guide on how to behave, what to learn and how to learn. They lose their internal motivation to learn because they don’t have any say in how or what they want to learn. The idea of freedom as a motivational force came from my own experience growing up. As the most rebellious kid I know, I remember developing aversions towards things simply because my parents gave me instructions on them. But somehow, when my parents left them alone, I felt more attracted towards those things. My new pencil sharpener, our new microwave, from the moment I saw them, I wanted to fiddle around with the machineries, to press the buttons, to play, and to experiment. But when my parents told me “the proper way” to use them, I would lose interest or get annoyed. Many kids have a natural curiosity towards new things. They also prefer the feeling of control and autonomy when interacting with these new things. We can encourage this level of curiosity and interest by minimizing adult intervention. In a classroom, there can’t be complete freedom, but what if there are more? Will students fill the void their teachers left with their own style of learning?

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A Culture of Learning - Part 3

In societies with this culture of learning, there is always a general consensus that education is the surest path to success. It is clear to the parents and students of these societies that success as an adult (whether it is in career, finances, or social) is clearly and directly related to academic performance when one was still young. 

In these countries, students tend to go through rounds of selection and rewards based purely on academic results. The best jobs and employers select their new employees based on university school names and grades. The most prestigious universities select from the best high schools or prep schools the students with the highest grades. Unlike in the US, where college entrance standardized tests are optional, and where colleges select based on a mix of factors such as sports and extracurricular activities, universities in these countries select based on academic achievements alone. Hierarchies based on grades are also clearly established in classrooms, starting from when the students are just teenagers. Students are constantly reminded that their grades can and do represent their identity and can be an indicator of their future success. 

There are of course many flaws with this system, chief among which is the ethical issue of deciding futures of young people based on their test scores. Are tests the most accurate measurement of student skills? Is it too early to judge young people’s talents at the age of 16 or 18? However, these issues should be far from the concerns of the American Education system, which veers towards the other extreme of not emphasizing academic performance enough. The key concern of the US should be: what are the long-term economic and social consequences if our students continue to fall behind other nations in academic performance? And how can we bring back the culture of learning in order to catch up?

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Teaching Young Children

I have been teaching English to two young french children for a few months now. At first I was their babysitter, but their parents wanted me to add an extra hour of pure teaching to our time together. During that hour, I have planned structured learning as well as games. The learning include mainly useful vocabulary and simple sentence structures. I designed the games around the vocabulary to help them apply the words.  

This is my first time teaching young kids (ages 5 and 6), and at least for now, things have been quite rough for me. Different from teaching adults, the difficulties of teaching children is harder for the teacher to comprehend and sympathize (because we’re not children ourselves). So here I made a list of the difficulties of teaching children. I need to look into how to tackle each of these. 

Motivational problems  - They are not internally motivated  - They don’t understand the reasons or the importance of their learning  - They give up or lose interest easily when things grow harder 

Behavioral problems  - Their attention spans are short - They can get randomly emotional  - They are not patient  - They don’t know how to control their own bodies  - Book learning is different from the experiential learning they’re used to  

Cognitive difficulties  - They have very little prior experience or background with the knowledge  - They may not understand the logic behind things  - They don’t understand how the new information fit in with their needs and lives  - They don’t know where to use or apply the new information

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The Math Brain - Part 4

The ability to internalize rules also helps a great deal in learning Math. Math is a subject where all information is governed by rules. Rules guide how formulas are written, how they are used. Some procedures derive directly from logic. For example, if x is the only unknown, it has to be the number that completes the equation. But many other procedures and rules may seem arbitrary. The writing and symbols we use to express Math, for example, are quite random. Why use the letters x and y to express unknowns? Why are ratios expressed by a horizontal line in between two numbers? It’s these small and arbitrary that end up confusing the young brains that are trying to sort out all the mysteries of the subject. Students may not know which are the rules to follow in some situations or not in others. 

As a student, I was quick to understand and internalize the rules in Math. Encountering a new rule, my brain never doubts its veracity, it simply accepts it as truth and tries to use it. But not all brains treat rules the same way. Some brains don’t do well with arbitrary rules. Some brains like to challenge rules. Faced with a Math problem that requires the application of rules, those ways of thinking don’t do well. But on the contrary, those ways of thinking might work exceptionally well on an English or Social Studies problem that demands more creative or expansive thinking? We can also argue that this instinct to automatically learn and internalize rules is not conducive to critical thinking, which depends on an instinct of the brain to recognize, but also doubt and reflect upon the rules it’s been told. And in many subjects besides Math, this type of thinking is necessary.  

All of these reasons explain one thing -- that the Math Brain is a very general term, that the fact that some people are naturally good at Math is just a myth. Being able to learn Math takes many different skills, including ability to listen and focus, ability to perceive logic, ability to internalize rules, and etc. None of them are set skills that someone is born with. I gained my listening skills by discussing with my parents on social issues since I was little. Some of these skills, such as being able to perceive logic, can also be a result of habitual ways of thinking. Some of these habits, such as the instinct to follow and apply rules, may be unconducive to other types of learning. Being good at Math also depends on one’s interest in Math, whether or not someone prefers a single set solution to a problem for example. To me, none of these skills can be judged as better or more preferable than others. So let’s stop judging students as intelligent or not based on whether or not they possess the specific skill sets that lead them to be better at Math or Science.

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The Math Brain - Part 3

The other thing that might have contributed to my understanding of Math is my ability to understand quickly any new idea. I have always been fast at understanding new or complex concepts that other people explain to me. This applied to rules of new games, or new concepts in class, or even foreign ideas my parents discussed. I had no trouble understanding adults, their words, logic, or emotions. This could also mean several things. I might simply have better listening or verbal communication skills. I have always been a very focused student, and good at following the chain of a conversation or a presentation. My parents have always talked to me about serious subjects like current events or social issues. They have always engaged me in any family discussions. It could just mean that this kind of interpersonal/oral learning style fits my experience and background. 

I’ve also realized early on that I am good at focusing on the big picture rather than the details. Presented with any problems, I would always try to understand the grand scheme of things or the major logical structure. For example, whenever I learn a new game, the first question I need to know is “what is the end goal of this game?” It’s the same way with classes. I’ve always been good at summarizing, picking out important points, or understanding the logical flow of things. I cannot allow myself to be lost in the details without first understanding how the details fit into the larger picture. This helped me immensely in Math, because I always figured out how the formulas and rules are used or not used and then transferred them to new situations with ease. Yet isn’t this tendency more of a personality trait than an academic cognitive ability? Understanding things from a broad perspective or a narrow applies to all kinds of situations and problems in life, and neither perspective is thought of as better than the other. It’s even part of the Briggs Meyer’s Personality Test, which means it shouldn’t be more than a personality difference? 

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Many people believed that certain skills, such as Math or Music, are innate or genetic. You either are good at it or you’re not. I’ve always doubted this theory.

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The Math Brain - Part 2

There are of course many answers to these question. Many people (especially students) seem to think that certain skills, such as Math or Music, are innate or genetic. You either are good at it or you’re not. Some subjects like English may be improved with hard work, but Math just seems so natural to some people and not others! I’ve always doubted this theory. On one hand, I agree that understanding math was like an intuition that came from I don’t know where, it was like a familiar language that just spoke to me. But on the other hand, I still had to think hard whenever I learned any new Math concepts. I remember learning multiplication in grade 2. The idea of “a number of a times a number is added” was really odd to me, and it took me a few days of mulling it over in my head to understand. But this particular memory intrigued me on a few points. First, it was an easy concept that I found very difficult. Second, I was insistent on understanding it. I kept thinking about it after class and even talked to my dad about it. And third, this occurred to me when I was just 8. I can’t help but be proud of my younger self who could deal with Math difficulties with such perseverance! It was this pattern of perseverance in the face of dealing with Math challenges that helped me immensely in the following years. Overtime, as it became a habit for me, my Math skills naturally improved. 

What ignited my interest to think about the “multiplication question” for so long in the first place? I was of course a very competitive child who wanted to succeed academically and who wanted to impress all those around me. But more than difficulties in Chinese, or Science, or English (I was in an elementary school in China and those were our main subjects), I was always more zealous about tackling unsolved Math problems. Before a Math problem, I always heard another voice of intuition that told me “I can solve this”, “I am smart enough”, “this cannot elude me for long”. And this doesn’t occur for the other subjects. Where did this stubborn confidence in Math ultimately come from? No one in my family except my Aunt was good at Math. My dad was hopeless disinterested in helping with my Math homework from grade 3 onwards. My mom’s solution was always “plug in all the multiple choice responses and see which one works the best”…. I had to investigate the answers from within. 

One clue was that I had always been interested in watching mystery shows and solving puzzles since before school. Games like Clue, animes like Detective Conan, or books like Harry Potter were my favorites. I simply loved the exhilaration and the satisfaction of a definitive answer that dissipates all mysteries with the light of logic. I was also good at guessing plot endings through luck or logic. These early successes could have subconsciously given me the confidence to solve more puzzles. And perhaps Math was just an academic extension of that, and my interest continued from my natural love of solving mysteries. 

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The Math Brain - Part 1

As a teenager I never understood why some students struggled with Math. Math was the subject that made the most sense to me. I could be lost in English or American History, but the problems and solutions in Math always seemed so perfectly clear and logical to me that I wondered “how can it be any other way?” How can a triangle’s interior angles add up to anything other than 180 degrees? How can the slope of a line be measured otherwise than rise-over-run? Math was the jigsaw piece that made everything work out. And for some lucky reason, I was good at understanding this puzzle. I could understand a new concept the first time a teacher explains it. I could see the logic behind formulas and apply it immediately to another question. Perhaps because I was good at it, I was also super interested in Math. If someone presented me with a math problem, it would just suck in my brain for hours or however long it took for me to solve it. 

The other students saw me as just another intelligent Asian kid, but I felt guilty for being considered smart. I didn’t feel like I was any smarter than other students. As a teenager, I was just as awkward, and just as self-conscious as everyone else. I didn’t know how to talk to teachers or boys I liked, I didn’t know how to make my parents prefer me to my sister, how could I be considered smart? In college, having met so many students with cool talents and passions, I also didn’t feel like I was more intelligent than others. At work, surrounded by coworkers of different age, backgrounds, experiences and amazing talents, I definitely disagree that I stand out in intelligence. So I’m more puzzled than ever by this question that, like a math problem, has intrigued me since middle school. Why is it that students are simply “better at school”? Why is it that some students succeed in the classroom learning of certain subjects (like Math) while others don’t?