Cap’n Refsmmat’s Blog of Doom

I’m often rather disturbed by how mathematics is taught in school. Take, for example, the way I was taught the following (important) equation:

Those of you familiar with calculus will immediately recognize what this means. Those of you who aren’t should know that the above set of squiggly lines means something very important in the upper levels of confusing math.

When I first was taught the equation I was taught it by being exposed to it exactly as I just exposed it to you: an equation. There were some words with it too, but they made just as much sense as the equation did at the time. A few moments later the teacher explained what the equation means: one can find the definite integral of an equation using its antiderivatives.

But we were never taught why that’s the case.

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Labs are a great idea for teaching students chemistry, physics, and all the other assorted sciences. They allow students to learn for themselves just how various laws and theories work, and to hopefully discover various phenomena themselves.

Okay, correction: Labs would be a great idea if they were used for the above purpose. But they aren’t.

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I have recently been reminded of the agony that is literary analysis — that is, the science of dissecting an author’s work and determining what rhetorical techniques he used and for what purpose he used them.

I say “agony” because it is agony — you can spend hours staring at a few paragraphs attempting to eke out hidden meanings that are supposedly there.

I have, however, become convinced that is mainly a farce.

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HAHA IM WRITING ON CAPNS BLOAWG!