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Anecdotally I had a misandrist/sexist teacher in fourth grade. It was the first grade where they split our maths class. I didn't fail the class, but that teache

by kodah 4y ago

Anecdotally I had a misandrist/sexist teacher in fourth grade. It was the first grade where they split our maths class. I didn't fail the class, but that teacher rode me extremely hard. She did do other abusive things, like encouraging students to bully each other, and she'd throw an eraser and hit me with a ruler on two separate occasions because she believed I wasn't awake enough. She recommended at the end of the year that I was put in a lower math class and that's where I went. I didn't recover my interests in math until after college. With some irony, she cited my lack of interest in maths as a whole. Two years later I was programming, which up until high school I didn't see how that translated to the maths I learned in school.

jason-phillips 4y ago
The American public school system is a veritable penal colony proxy. My experience with math was much the same. As someone on the tail end of the Bell curve and for whom such a monolithic system was a poor fit, I wasted over a dozen years of my life there, in unfortunately what were my most formative years. Luckily my siblings are correcting that with their children.
- wccrawford 4y ago
  I know someone who got their first B in band because that teacher didn't think that anyone should get all As. Nevermind how hard she worked, nobody was allowed to get all As if that teacher could help it. She cried, and I am still pissed about it to this day. What an awful person.
  - boole1854 4y ago
    What a bizarre teaching philosophy.
    - macinjosh 4y ago
      I'd categorize more as a power trip than a teach philosophy, but I guess that is a kinder way of stating it :)
  - inanutshellus 4y ago
    I spent a semester in a foreign country. The teacher gave me what would translate back as a "C" saying I'd done a great job. Turns out in order to get an A in "Absolute Beginner's Crash Course In [Language]" you had to be fluent. :-\
- RHSeeger 4y ago
  It depends entirely where you are. I have fond memories of Math in school; particularly in 6th and 10-12th grades. Teachers were interesting and extremely invested in making sure we enjoyed ourselves and the material. When we were bored, they switched things up to get us interested.
  - jason-phillips 4y ago
    For most (~80%), it's a good fit. However, if you learn several orders of magnitude faster or slower than most, it's not. For example, if you're ready for university-level material when you're thirteen, then no amount of switching it up will serve the student well. To speak to your experience, I think it's fantastic that you had great teachers.
- kodah 4y ago
  Some more bits: It was actually a private school, but I don't doubt that during this time period similar things were happening in public school. The private school I went to was very big on standardized testing and what got me into the upper math course in the first place was my standardized testing score. My math scores, throughout my time at that school, declined after fourth grade because the "lower" class was roughly two years behind the upper class. This effect would leak into the sciences too because curriculum obviously was difficult to align at that point.
throwaway290 4y ago
Similar experience at school in Russia, also with maths. No sexism, just an extreme bully and encouraged bullying. Forever put me off maths. I sincerely think she completely sucked at her job but sociopath-politicked her way to teaching the classes with the kids that were labeled the brightest (i.e. mostly from good families, upper middle class, almost no ethnic minorities, etc.), they tend to succeed and go to good universities for some unfathomable reason (sarcasm) and she could take the credit.
norwalkbear 4y ago
I think we've all that misandrist teacher who tried to destroy us. I get people are emotional animals, and women were oppressed. Some women see it as their divine right to hurt boys for the sins of their ancestors. But it's not. Leave the kids alone.

by kodah 4y ago

jason-phillips 4y ago

The American public school system is a veritable penal colony proxy. My experience with math was much the same. As someone on the tail end of the Bell curve and for whom such a monolithic system was a poor fit, I wasted over a dozen years of my life there, in unfortunately what were my most formative years. Luckily my siblings are correcting that with their children.

wccrawford 4y ago
I know someone who got their first B in band because that teacher didn't think that anyone should get all As. Nevermind how hard she worked, nobody was allowed to get all As if that teacher could help it. She cried, and I am still pissed about it to this day. What an awful person.
- boole1854 4y ago
  What a bizarre teaching philosophy.
  - macinjosh 4y ago
    I'd categorize more as a power trip than a teach philosophy, but I guess that is a kinder way of stating it :)
- inanutshellus 4y ago
  I spent a semester in a foreign country. The teacher gave me what would translate back as a "C" saying I'd done a great job. Turns out in order to get an A in "Absolute Beginner's Crash Course In [Language]" you had to be fluent. :-\
RHSeeger 4y ago
It depends entirely where you are. I have fond memories of Math in school; particularly in 6th and 10-12th grades. Teachers were interesting and extremely invested in making sure we enjoyed ourselves and the material. When we were bored, they switched things up to get us interested.
- jason-phillips 4y ago
  For most (~80%), it's a good fit. However, if you learn several orders of magnitude faster or slower than most, it's not. For example, if you're ready for university-level material when you're thirteen, then no amount of switching it up will serve the student well. To speak to your experience, I think it's fantastic that you had great teachers.
kodah 4y ago
Some more bits: It was actually a private school, but I don't doubt that during this time period similar things were happening in public school. The private school I went to was very big on standardized testing and what got me into the upper math course in the first place was my standardized testing score. My math scores, throughout my time at that school, declined after fourth grade because the "lower" class was roughly two years behind the upper class. This effect would leak into the sciences too because curriculum obviously was difficult to align at that point.

throwaway290 4y ago

Similar experience at school in Russia, also with maths. No sexism, just an extreme bully and encouraged bullying. Forever put me off maths. I sincerely think she completely sucked at her job but sociopath-politicked her way to teaching the classes with the kids that were labeled the brightest (i.e. mostly from good families, upper middle class, almost no ethnic minorities, etc.), they tend to succeed and go to good universities for some unfathomable reason (sarcasm) and she could take the credit.

norwalkbear 4y ago

I think we've all that misandrist teacher who tried to destroy us. I get people are emotional animals, and women were oppressed. Some women see it as their divine right to hurt boys for the sins of their ancestors. But it's not. Leave the kids alone.