Well last week, Tues Jan 10 to be exact, was the first day of school.
When I walked into Math 20 (Fundamentals of Mathematics), it wasn't just a class. It was the beginning. My beginning. My beginning of the long, happy journey I have dreamed of undertaking ever since I graduated high school. Of course, my ultimate goal is to obtain a degree but at this point in my life, I know that I am going to get more out of the journey. All that learning. All that mind expansion. That makes me smile.
The fact that my first class is basic math tells me that my mind clearly needs some expanding. But you know what, I have spoken to two other people in my class who are in the same boat as I am. They work full-time, decided to start school and this is their first class. Both said they scored high in reading and writing but scrapped the bottom in math. Is that indicative of the fact that we really don't do a lot of math in the real world? Could be...but I think it's more that we DON'T have to do math in the real world. Calculators and Excel do the math for us. The most math I do on any regular basis is figuring 20% of a bill for the tip! I try to do math in the real world such as figuring out if it's cheaper to buy 5 lbs. of oranges at $3.00 or buy 5 lbs. of loose oranges at .89 a lb. I rarely find opportunity to figure out if x times y = z then does x2 times y3 = z2 and x3 times y4 = z2? Yeah, the placement test was that kind of crap....I knew I was a goner when I saw all those friggin' "to the power of" things. I even took all the practice tests but there was NO CLUE about that junk. If I had thought more about it, I might have been able to figure some of it out but I just choked!
Oh well, I scored well in Reading and Writing. Good thing...I do those on a regular basis! :-)
Love you and hope something made you smile EXTRA BIG today!
Oh no, not math! Do they really have you take that in college? Count me out. Just kidding. Of course your approach in getting that ball rolling ASAP is the right thing to do. Way to go Shell!
Posted by: renee | January 19, 2006 at 03:47 PM
You will do very well, Shelly Shell. I hated math but liked algebra. Go figure. Maybe you will eventually feel the same. However, I only had 9th grade algebra so it must have been the bare basics. (The teacher's name was Miss Beaver -- no kidding.) I just remember that I loved the equations where if blankety blank = blankety blank, what is X? You keep subtracting and/or adding to each side of the equation until you are finally left with X = whatever. It was so symmetrical! But the "thought" problems where I had to create my own equation to find X did stink!! Well, that's all I have to say about that. Love, Mommy
Posted by: Mommy/Grandma | January 20, 2006 at 09:52 AM