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ironchef
Canada1350 Posts
 I think the kind of "skills" or habits you need to do get good scores and grades( for pre-university) can be bruteforced through lots of work. Atleast in the education system here, it's all studying and memorizing. The good shit like proofs and difficult mathematical concepts are never really covered in highschool. (Hell, with a little creativity, you can bruteforce pass Uni too, but youre just wasting your own time/money) | ||
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Catch]22
Sweden2683 Posts
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Z3kk
4099 Posts
I've actually never learned multiplication tables. My parents told me to, but I ended up just memorizing the individual products, so in my mind it would just pop up when I thought of the factors... | ||
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spinesheath
Germany8679 Posts
The western numbers have all the same information in them, they just use position of digits instead of whole new signs for 10, 100 and so on. So there we have a disadvantage: The western system only uses 10 digits, the asian system uses about 10 + log10(number range). Plus/Minus 1 I guess, to lazy to check. An asian child has to be taught the numbers 0 to 9, the number 10 and multiplication to calculate stuff up to 99. A western child has to be taught the numbers 0 to 9, multiplication and the concept of higher digit positions. Both systems need a deeper understanding whenever it's not something simple as simple as 10 * x, 10 + x, (10+x) - x. To become good at mathematics you need practice. A lot of practice, even if your naturally talented. For most people that's the single most important factor. And we all know that working hard and is a common theme in asian culture. | ||
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Wala.Revolution
7584 Posts
I attribute math proficiency to practice, and I had to do these 3000 'Question Bank' series in middle school which just contained nothing but questions. | ||
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Cauld
United States350 Posts
On July 09 2010 04:41 mucker wrote: Do you honestly think your simplistic explanation accounts for that graph? A slight linguistic difference that may or may not even exist in Asian immigrant households makes their performance in a highschool aged test that much better? How do you explain the black children performing so poorly? They are learning the same numbers as the white kids when they grow up. Let's not ignore other factors. For example: I suspect Asian immigrants are likely to be higher educated than average Americans in general, especially if they immigrated first for college, or graduate degrees. Of course not all Asian immigrants entered the US that way, some were refugees, etc. or were sponsored by family members, etc. Math based degrees, like engineering, seem to be in higher demand in Asian countries in general, thanks to their rapid growth creating a higher demand for engineers. | ||
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Inkarnate
Canada840 Posts
Though you raise a very valid argument. | ||
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semantics
10040 Posts
What helps in math is doing the work and being dedicated to it, Asian Americans are more likely 1st or 2nd generation from being immigrant parents, they tend to come from a stricter culture most kids i know that are Asian don't speak any asian language (unless their Chinese for some reason a ton of cheese force their children to learn it, again Anecdotal evidence) I have no proof of anything but i rather think it's becuase Asian parents tend to force their children to do well academically, you know those Dad:you a doctor yet? kid: no dad i'm 12 Dad: you a disgrace, come back when you a doctor. jokes come from somewhere. In other words i think it has to do more when cultural habits then learning a language, i learned math from my father who taught me at a young age to use a slide rule instead of a calculator, i tend to do math in my head with a greater amount of accuracy and speed then most other people i know and i attribute that to learning the slide rule. http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/309280/may-12-2010/stephen-s-sound-advice---how-to-ace-the-sats | ||
rotinegg
United States1719 Posts
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gdroxor
United States639 Posts
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Golden Ghost
Netherlands1041 Posts
If you would look to all different systems you would most likely find out your theory wouldn't hold up. On July 09 2010 05:04 spinesheath wrote: So what if you ask an asian child to subtract 3 from 12? Sorry but the 12 - 2 example only applies in very few cases. I would hardly call that an advantage of the asian number system. The western numbers have all the same information in them, they just use position of digits instead of whole new signs for 10, 100 and so on. So there we have a disadvantage: The western system only uses 10 digits, the asian system uses about 10 + log10(number range). Plus/Minus 1 I guess, to lazy to check. An asian child has to be taught the numbers 0 to 9, the number 10 and multiplication to calculate stuff up to 99. A western child has to be taught the numbers 0 to 9, multiplication and the concept of higher digit positions. Both systems need a deeper understanding whenever it's not something simple as simple as 10 * x, 10 + x, (10+x) - x. To become good at mathematics you need practice. A lot of practice, even if your naturally talented. For most people that's the single most important factor. And we all know that working hard and is a common theme in asian culture. I couldn't have said it better myself. | ||
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Cow
Canada1104 Posts
On July 09 2010 05:17 semantics wrote: I have no proof of anything but i rather think it's becuase Asian parents tend to force their children to do well academically, you know those Dad:you a doctor yet? kid: no dad i'm 12 Dad: you a disgrace, come back when you a doctor. jokes come from somewhere. you dishona to famiry! | ||
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GreEny K
Germany7312 Posts
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Kalingingsong
Canada633 Posts
seriously, i think Asians just do 'better' at math because they are forced to do it more [and it's pretty boring mostly]. When I was in grade school in China, we had these exercises, where we always had to do 300 questions of random simple calculations such as 4+3=?, and 5+6=? etc etc [with a time limit]. But when u get to middle school, you can feel very easy to think about more complicated concepts, because the simpler 'mechanics' of math takes no thinking. | ||
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dcberkeley
Canada844 Posts
Furthermore, all this provides is faster learning at a low level if you're chinese. The graph is kinda off. If you want to compare people who learn by chinese and english, then you group them by such and not by race. | ||
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yoshi_yoshi
United States440 Posts
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danl9rm
United States3111 Posts
On July 09 2010 04:31 ooni wrote: that helps too but that wouldn't really explain this ![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5d/SAT-math-by-race-ethnicity.png) Assumming statistics are correct and most of Asian Americans that do well in math are 1.5 or 2nd generation. We don't actually mean math theory. We mean math as in schooling. If you think about it Germans have great mathmaticians if not one of the bests in the world but not many of them are good at math during schooling. And yes I know Germans! this looks like an economic graph to me. don't you think that could be the reason for the differences? | ||
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semantics
10040 Posts
On July 09 2010 06:19 danl9rm wrote: this looks like an economic graph to me. don't you think that could be the reason for the differences? if it was economic graph whites would be above asians by a bit. edit:i forget old money super rich people inheritance doesn't actually count as getting an income to skew the graph. ![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/ac/Race_Income.png) | ||
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Wayra
195 Posts
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evanthebouncy!
United States12796 Posts
But I've lived in U.S. for almost... 9 years now? And all my theoretical math I learned here, my understand of math in Chinese covers up to solving systems of linear equations and that is all, which comes nowhere close to my math education in the States. Still, when it comes to arithmentics, Chinese language makes so much more sense than English so I never ever do arithmentic in English because it sucks balls compared to Chinese in terms of simplicity and speed, even pronounciation. | ||
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