I just realized why I even care about this: I'm still mad from first grade or whenever it was we learned subtraction, and they told me that if I had written (say) 2-5, I must have written it wrong. Just tell me I'll learn how to do that later! Not that it's impossible!!!1!-1!!
Kaylee: H-how did you... g-get on...? Early: Strains the mind a bit, don't it? You think you're all alone. Maybe I come down the chimney, Kaylee. Bring presents to the good girls and boys.
'Objects In Space'
Natter 34: Freak With No Name
Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.
Jesse - Apr 18, 2005 2:40:27 pm PDT #6687 of 10001
Sometimes I trip on how happy we could be.
Glamcookie - Apr 18, 2005 2:54:22 pm PDT #6688 of 10001
I know my own heart and understand my fellow man. But I am made unlike anyone I have ever met. I dare to say I am like no one in the whole world. - Anne Lister
At least you didn't have a nun telling you that if you erased, angels would tell her you did and you'd fail.
t still not over Sister Patricia - shudder
DawnK - Apr 18, 2005 2:59:06 pm PDT #6689 of 10001
giraffe mode
is very, very glad she did not have Sister Patricia as a teacher
lori - Apr 18, 2005 3:04:03 pm PDT #6690 of 10001
!!!1!-1!!
love this.
Jesse - Apr 18, 2005 3:04:50 pm PDT #6691 of 10001
Sometimes I trip on how happy we could be.
HMOG. I had some wacky teachers, but none like THAT! Why did god put erasers right there on the ends of pencils if we're not supposed to use them??
Topic!Cindy - Apr 18, 2005 3:23:40 pm PDT #6692 of 10001
What is even happening?
At least you didn't have a nun telling you that if you erased, angels would tell her you did and you'd fail.Oh, no.
Also? I adore your tag, GC.
(for posterity)
Heaven Less Opulent Than Vatican, Reports Disappointed Pope - Onion headline
Emily - Apr 18, 2005 3:39:51 pm PDT #6693 of 10001
"In the equation E = mc⬧, c⬧ is a pretty big honking number." - Scola
I just realized why I even care about this: I'm still mad from first grade or whenever it was we learned subtraction, and they told me that if I had written (say) 2-5, I must have written it wrong. Just tell me I'll learn how to do that later! Not that it's impossible!!!1!-1!!
Actually, how to handle this is actually a serious pedagogical question. There are a lot of things that get taught as rules in the early grades that are relevant for a certain number system but not for the ones they'll learn later. Thing is, 2-5 really is impossible in the set of natural numbers (the set is closed under addition and multiplication, but not under subtraction or division).
Even so, your teacher was pedagogically wrong, cause telling the kid they're just wrong, without any explanation or encouragement? Wrong like a wrong thing.
(But that's a thing, see, because they don't tell you there are different number systems! They just keep showing you new rules, and you go, "But last year you said I couldn't do that!" and they say, "No, you can do that" like it never happened! Anyway, there are different number systems. Just so you know. And in the natural numbers, there are no negatives.)
Actually, I think Feynman says something like this at the beginning of Six Easy Pieces, about how, to start to learn physics, you have to learn rules which are actually wrong.
Anyway, I'm agreeing with you that that was an unhelpful and bad thing for her to do.
Emily - Apr 18, 2005 3:41:55 pm PDT #6694 of 10001
"In the equation E = mc⬧, c⬧ is a pretty big honking number." - Scola
And also -- dude, I knew about King George III and the madness, but I didn't know he had porphyria! Did you all know that Mary Queen of Scots had porphyria? Wicked!
amych - Apr 18, 2005 3:45:33 pm PDT #6695 of 10001
Now let us crush something soft and watch it fountain blood. That is a girlish thing to want to do, yes?
Even so, your teacher was pedagogically wrong, cause telling the kid they're just wrong, without any explanation or encouragement? Wrong like a wrong thing.
Yes yes yes a thousand times yes.
Signed, Was told "there's no such thing as a negative number"
PS, equally bad is "be quiet - you're not allowed to know that yet".
Sheryl - Apr 18, 2005 3:49:54 pm PDT #6696 of 10001
Fandom means never having to say "But where would I wear that?"
Timelies all!
Happy Birthday to Beth and Beej!
Healthma to all who need it!
G's dad took us out to dinner for my birthday. Tomorrow is the only day his week we have to cook, as my folks are coming in to town Wed.