Dyscalculic. Dyscalculia or math disability is a specific disability that is learning innate difficulty in learning or comprehending simple mathematics.

Symptoms include:
- Incapacity to understand financial planning or budgeting
- Trouble with conceptualizing some time judging the moving of time. Can be chronically late or early
- Often unable to grasp and remember mathematical concepts, rules, formulae, and sequences
- Difficulty navigating or mentally ‘turning’ the map to face the present direction rather than the common North=Top usage
- Inability to concentrate on mentally tasks that are intensive
As in: ‘I am starting to wonder if I’m dyscalculic because I can not seem to improve my math SAT rating, despite all of my studying.’
University as Job Training
Interesting conversations happening in the comments of this post, one of which has to do with whether or not college ought to be profession training.
Being a liberal arts degree holder, i would ike to think that my kids could have that same possibility, should they had been so inclined. Within my fantasy world, they use summer internships to explore career options and get to study art, literary works and history in college. Have always been I dreaming?
Elise, an engineer, and commenter below, is the mom of 3 kids that are successful one of who got an 800 in the math SAT and is valedictorian of his course. She believes college is career training.
Thankfully, The Chronicle of Higher Education just published the Median Earnings by Major, for the practically minded.
Figure out how to Mastery, Then Add 20% More Study Time
A weeks that are few, my pal Catherine stated, ‘Debbie, it’s time and energy to read Daniel Willingham.’
Willingham is a professor of cognitive psychology at the University of Virginia. His website is just a treasure trove of useful information regarding just how we learn.
From Willingham’s article, What Will Improve A student’s Memory:
Wanting to remember some-thing doesn’t always have much bearing on whether or perhaps not you will actually remember it….Here’s the manner in which you should think about memory: oahu is the residue of thought, meaning that the more you think about something, the much more likely it is that you’ll remember it later.
Pupils allocated, on average, simply 68 percent of the right time had a need to get the target score. We are able to sum this up by saying the third concept is that people tend to think their learning is more complete than it really is.
The final strategy to avoid forgetting is always to overlearn…..Students should learn how to write a biology paper it took to master the material until they know the material and then keep studying……A good rule of thumb is to put in another 20 percent of the time.
The entire article is definitely worth the read.
I have been doling out the recommendations like little Scooby treats to my son, as he prepares for finals. Interestingly, he is interested and is using the advice.
The Benign Cousin to Rote Knowledge
The more I read Daniel Willingham, the more I comprehend why the SAT can be so difficult for me. I’m lacking the inspiration knowledge that I need to problem re solve on these tests.
From Willingham’s article on Inflexible Knowledge:
An even more cousin that is benign rote knowledge is what I would call ‘inflexible’ knowledge. On top it might appear rote, but it’s perhaps not. And, it’s absolutely vital to students’ education: Inflexible knowledge seems to function as unavoidable foundation of expertise, including that part of expertise that enables individuals to solve novel dilemmas by applying current knowledge to new situations—sometimes known popularly as ‘problem-solving’ skills.
Knowledge is flexible with regards to can be accessed out of the context in which it had been learned and applied in brand new contexts. Flexible knowledge is of course a goal that is desirable but it is not an effortlessly achieved one. When encountering new material, the human brain appears to be biased towards learning the area features of problems, perhaps not toward grasping the deep framework that is essential to produce flexible knowledge.
Over Twenty Thousand Students Took SAT Prep in China year that is last
As my SAT scores continue to plateau, despite months of study and determination (and a complete large amount of fun), I’ve stomped my feet and declared on a lot more than one occasion: ‘Who are these kids rocking the SAT and what exactly are their parents feeding them?’
From May 5, 2011 Business Week:
Twenty thousand students took SAT prep in China with ‘New Oriental’ last year, representing at the least a 90 % share of that market……
‘New Oriental seems to have cracked the SAT code,’ claims Phillip Muth, associate dean for admissions at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. Its 1,200 candidates from Asia this had an average of 610 out of 800 on the SAT’s reading section and 670 in writing, as opposed to 641 in reading and 650 in writing for U.S. applicants year. In math, an average was achieved by them of 783, weighed against 669 for U.S. students. ‘
It isn’t lost on me either that English is a language that is second.
