« day school | Main | wrath of the math »

maths, special for you

Maths fact of the day:
You probably know that when you have a divided by b, then a is the dividend, and b is the divisor.

But, did you know that when you add a to b, then both a and b are addenols? When you multiply, you have a multiplicand and a multiplicator. Anyone care to venture a guess what the names are for subtraction?

This is probably only a fact for Americans, but in Britain they say Maths for Mathematics! I like it. It's called Maths from now on in my book.

I'm just getting back into maths, after a relatively disastrous experiment with them in High School. My guide in this endeavor is one Natasha Kholomiyeva, a teacher at North Seattle Community College.

She is a fine woman, who doesn't speak English all that well, but appears to have a fairly good sense of humor, which makes up for a lot in my book. When someone complained that they couldn't understand her, and was afraid of asking her to repeat herself, she replied, "I am traditional teacher. I can repeat again and again and again without wishing to kill."

We have Problem Sets that are basically long-term, take-home tests, and then homework. The Problem Sets are graded, but the homework is not. At first I wasn't sure what the difference was between the two, and when I asked to confirm whether the homework was graded or not, she replied, "If you want me to look at your homework, do not worry, I will go over it. Special for you."

Comments

Sounds like good parenting skills too:

"I can repeat again and again and again without wishing to kill." That's actually a pretty difficult social skill to acheive. Drives ME nuts!

Do you really want your homework graded "special for you"?

The "special for you" was definately said with an implied wink. I don't even want to DO my homework, much less have it gone over with a fine tooth comb. She just misunderstood and thought I wanted the opportunity to have my stuff looked at. She was trying to be both reassuring and give me a hard time at the same time. That's what I liked about her.

wow you said "maths" instead of "math"! how cool is that!? just like an aussie.

or like a brit, like you say. but i choose to think of it as aussie. hehe.

You most certainly DO want your stuff looked at, just not by your maths teacher.

Some call it math, mathematics, maths, or the kind of words that are replaced by random punctuation in the comics.. %^%@%@%! College Algebra....

I believe the translation there from dear Bill is, GOOD LUCK with the f'n maths.