Because Mr. Tristem asked the class to comment on this…
Growing up, I was taught math(s) by rote. Memorize, memorize, memorize. Simply put, I can not learn that way. I do need to understand the “why” behind things, and for most of my life, I never thought there was a “why” in mathematics. This lesson (and the lesson previous) elegantly demonstrated the “why” of e. I now feel I have a basic grasp of what e is, and have a hope to wrap my brain around its use.
In this moments (and previous aha moments in math lessons) I feel a new enthusiasm for mathematics, where I used to feel only apprehension and bewilderment. I actually feel that I can learn this stuff, and it is because I was shown the “why” of core principles.
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Well, I have very similar thoughts about this course. Here in Poland, in most schools there is no time for explaining even basic of basics. Here you have few dry math formulas, extremely simple examples, and have fun with that, solving much harder exercises. Being much older now, I finally want to learn it. Maybe this knowledge will be useful in my gamedev on hobby level.
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I used to hate algebra until I got into programming. It never made sense to me why we were ‘solving for X’ or even why the alphabet was necessary in math.
Now that I know about variables, I understand that ‘solving for X’ is just the same as 1 cup of rice and 1 3/4 cups of water.
My mom said she never used algebra (I don’t know any adults who admitted to using algebra when I was growing up), but now I realize that I use it all the time.
Cooking recipes are algebra. Money is algebra. Telling the time is algebra…etc…
Learning programming taught me the biggest lesson of all that helped everything make sense:
Algebra is all about VALUES and CONTEXT. It’s really nothing more than that. Values and context.
If I ask you to bring me 1 Cup of pancake mix and a 7:00 am, it won’t make sense because of the context.
If I ask you at 7:00 am to bring me 1 Cup of pancake mix 3/4 Cup water, 1 Tbsp oil and the waffle iron, you’ll know we’re making waffles for breakfast!
Very similar when you’re passing variables into a method. It’s all about values and context.
Programming helped me understand this.
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