The way algebra was taught in school made it impossible to understand; the math had no point to it, no context.
It wasn’t until I was drafting electrical designs and had to determine voltage drop across circuits that algebra finally made sense. I became so involved in mathematics I taught myslef trig.
Too many schools are removing the types of classes, such as wood and machine shop, that gave ‘context’ to math class. That is a very great shame.
Here’s an example of Congressional math:
You have 700 billion dollars, and spend 900 billion. How many people could be provided for, from the remaining 1,600 billion, if we assume that each person needs 20,000 a month which adds up to 2 million a year?
ditto. As an ADD kid I struggled with algebra until I completed 8 hours of College Physics. After that Integral and Deferential Calculus wasn’t as difficult as I had anticipated.
As a machinist, I too taught myself to do trig. I now can solve any math problem the machine shop can throw at me. I never applied myself to any math ed in school because I just didn't see the context or much need of it at the time.
I struggled for a long time but finally overcame my lack of a good math education by cracking some books and using good old fashioned determination. If I never had the need of trig, I never would have bothered or cared about it one bit.
The way algebra was taught in school made it impossible to understand; the math had no point to it, no context.
I agree 100%
I learned almost nothing in my high school Math class. It didn’t help that the teacher would have been lost without her teachers guide. I had no problem with the math in Chemistry and Physics. Those classes were where I learned math.