Do the math: too much calculus? (2012)

Re:Do the math: too much calculus? (2012) by abecedarius on Wednesday October 19, 2016 @10:27PM (#12749411)

My guess is that math teaching can be a benefit to anyone at any age, but the usual curriculum on average mainly teaches people to hate math. (That's what's happening with my niece in grade school right now.) For some kids arithmetic may be boring, but at least it's easy, and they suffer less of this damage. If you start it later when they're readier, more of them will be open to learning a little actual math, not just gritting through baffling seemingly-arbitrary procedures.

Montessori schools are said to be better on this score, though I haven't looked into them.

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Re:Do the math: too much calculus? (2012) by dredmorbius on Thursday October 20, 2016 @08:06AM (#12751573)

I've been looking at John Cleese's presentations on creativity, and suspect he's very much on to something with the idea of play and humour as key to real learning. I also think that there are approaches which take this too far (video games and such), though I've learned a number of things from unexpected places.

Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, The Baroque Cycle, and Anathem, for example, are all explorations of ideas. The first two of business, banking, and money, in contemporary and historical times, respectively. The latter covers a great deal of historical thought.

Better authors of topics often incorporate humour in their writing -- someting the past few generations of academic literature would do well to consider. OTOH, it's a cure for insomnia.

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