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Math and Science Popular With Students Until They Realize They're Hard

Posted by timothy on from the luckily-I-skipped-out-early dept.

First time accepted submitter HonorPoncaCityDotCom writes "Khadeeja Safdar reports in the WSJ that researchers who surveyed 655 incoming college students found that while math and science majors drew the most interest initially, not many students finished with degrees in those subjects. Students who dropped out didn't do so because they discovered an unexpected amount of the work and because they were dissatisfied with their grades. "Students knew science was hard to begin with, but for a lot of them it turned out to be much worse than what they expected," says Todd R. Stinebrickner, one of the paper's authors. "What they didn't expect is that even if they work hard, they still won't do well." The authors add that the substantial overoptimism about completing a degree in science can be attributed largely to students beginning school with misperceptions about their ability to perform well academically in science. ""If more science graduates are desired, the findings suggest the importance of policies at younger ages that lead students to enter college better prepared (PDF) to study science.""

34 of 580 comments (clear)

  1. like anything else.. by houbou · · Score: 4, Insightful

    hard is merely the fact that often, the theories and equations taught are quite abstract. It is very important to have a solid grasp of concepts, but in the end, the material could be improved with visual and/or tangible results which have some values and/or association to the abstract concepts.

    1. Re:like anything else.. by Rockoon · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Whats needed is good educators, like Richard Feynman was. What passes for "good educator" these days is pathetic.

      --
      "His name was James Damore."
    2. Re:like anything else.. by ackthpt · · Score: 5, Insightful

      hard is merely the fact that often, the theories and equations taught are quite abstract. It is very important to have a solid grasp of concepts, but in the end, the material could be improved with visual and/or tangible results which have some values and/or association to the abstract concepts.

      I've had dozens of college profs and the ones which stood out were the ones who were good listeners as well and perceptive of what students struggle over. Generally I found when I thought a course was 'hard' I knew 80% or more of the material or concepts, but I was struggling over one or two things which blocked conceptual understanding of things further on.

      Subbing, as a TA once in a programming class I was perplexed how people couldn't wrap their heads around the idea of a Variable (think of it as a name on a bucket, into which I add or remove apples, yet they were still stumped).

      Things do tend to be more 'hard' when the student spends more time listening to their nay-saying peers than their instructors. When you actually believe Math, Chemistry or Physics is 'hard' your belief is your own largest obstacle to learning.

      --

      A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
    3. Re:like anything else.. by ackthpt · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Whats needed is good educators, like Richard Feynman was. What passes for "good educator" these days is pathetic.

      We could certainly do with a lot less people going around saying Math is hard. That's defeatist thinking. Math is easy!

      --

      A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
    4. Re:like anything else.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      Math is hard when the only reason the math teacher still has a job is "tenure" and/or "union."

    5. Re:like anything else.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No. Math is hard because it's like running long distances. Few people actually like running, or any kind of exercise. Many people do it for utilitarian reasons while hating it. Some people like it inherently, though. I had a gym teacher once who was addicted to running to the point that it was bad for his health.

    6. Re:like anything else.. by fredprado · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Math is the most difficult subject known by humankind. Basic math is very easy, college math is reasonably easy, engineering school math is quite hard, mathematics graduation math is considerably harder, and math research is ridiculously hard.

    7. Re:like anything else.. by expatriot · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Feynman was fantastic at inspiring people and giving them an intuition for physics with simple drawings.

      Do you think he understood partial differential equations, functions in a complex space, matrix math, group theory? Sure he did. If he wrote some of that on a blackboard in a 60 minute talk, would the audience struggle to keep up?

      I am still not sure I understand using 4x4 matrices to do transforms in three space. I can write the code though (slowly).

      My wife (English and Drama) said the biggest party people were the liberal arts students because they did not need as much time to study. And when they were studying they mostly were reading.

      A good educator can make learning calculus better than a poor one, but there it is still hard (well for me anyway).

    8. Re:like anything else.. by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1, Insightful

      In high school, your grades are primarily a reflection of how hard you work.

      In college, your grades are primarily a reflection on how smart you are.

    9. Re:like anything else.. by tylikcat · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I think there is something of a grades / work problem for many students. And I suspect that if bright students were more accustomed to classes where they could work fairly hard and not make As, undergraduate science classes would be less of a shock. A lot of the kids I see* turning away aren't doing badly - they're just used to doing so much better with so much less effort. Which is more or less what they've been trained to expect, after all.

      And people commonly attribute far more to talent than to hard work. So many kids look at the first physics exam where they've gotten a 67 (which is the lowest grade they've ever gotten in their lives, even if it was the third highest grade in the class) and become convinced that they're just not good at this stuff. I mean, their friends who are psych majors are pulling 4.0, and there they are with a 3.2 even though they spend an order of magnitude more time on their homework. Meanwhile, their parents are asking why their grades have fallen so much since highschool. (Okay, while all these are examples from people I know, they're not all the same person.)

      * I teach biology and neuroscience.

    10. Re:like anything else.. by ebno-10db · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Math is the most difficult subject known by humankind.

      Care to offer some evidence for that assertion?

    11. Re:like anything else.. by khallow · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Well, there aren't many fields with well-defined problems that have solutions which can't be found without many human generations of effort. And many math problems are known to be intractable. For example, the Halting problem.

      I mention that example because there is probably a Turing machine with input that can be fully described in modest time by a human, but which can't be determined to halt even using the entire resources of the known universe converted optimally into a computer and run for the rest of eternity.

    12. Re:like anything else.. by benf_2004 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I found the exact opposite to be true. I put forth minimal effort in high school (rarely studied, frequently daydreamed during classes, ignored lots of homework assignments) and graduated with honors. I tried to do the same thing when I started college and I was on academic probation after the first quarter. I learned then that I was actually going to have to put forth a reasonable amount of effort if I wanted to graduate.

    13. Re:like anything else.. by onkelonkel · · Score: 5, Insightful

      In high school a very smart student can get honours marks with minimal effort. In high school an average student can get honours marks by working very hard.

      In engineering school a very smart student needs to also work very hard just to get by. If you are diligent about doing all the problem assignments, hand in all the labs, study efficiently (in a small group really worked for me), be very strategic about obtaining all possible marks, you can do reasonably well. In engineering school an average student can't get by on hard work, because the workload is too high, and will likely fail.

      --
      None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.
    14. Re:like anything else.. by grizdog · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The problem with math, if problem is the right word, is that it changes its character, and the kind of thinking that is required at each level is quite different. It helps to be painstaking, but that is true in many fields. The skills required in arithmetic, algebra, calculus, discrete math, linear algebra, and number theory are all quite different, and students who think they are good at math move to the next level and find something quite foraign and quite unpleasant.

      Along with this is the problem of grade inflation in high schools. I spent most of my career as a college math professor, and I ran into students every year who thought they were good at math because they had gotten good grades in it, but when I handed out problem sets the first week which reviewed prerequisite material, they could not do them at all. Math is pretty standardized nationally - f you have completed Intermediate Algebra or Precalculus or Calculus 1, there is a standard collection of problems that the student ought to be able to solve - you can find them in any standard text. And since it was the first week, it wasn't because I was a bad teacher - they had barely been exposed to me. But even though their transcript said they had received an A or B in the course, they couldn't solve the problems at all. So suddenly they get to college and a subject that previously didn't require a lot of work, now requires a great deal of work. It happens all the time

    15. Re:like anything else.. by ebno-10db · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Well, there aren't many fields with well-defined problems that have solutions which can't be found without many human generations of effort.

      Does the fact that the problems are well defined mean that the subject is easier or harder?

    16. Re:like anything else.. by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Or because running long distances requires a constant amount of effort. You can't show up to a marathon 13 miles in, think it's over in less than 4, and expect to win anything or even get a sense of accomplishment.

      Math and science build, it starts very early, and it keeps building up. By high school most people are already severely disadvantaged. By college, the game is over but for the most dedicated. I will give these people a little credit, I think they truly want in and see the value, but get lost in college material and pacing, and don't even understand how they went wrong, They end up with retarded cop-outs like "i'm dumb at math" or "science makes no sense", which sometimes become self-fulfilling prophecies. They have to be approached like a physical fitness program: you start out easy or you will hurt yourself, and you work up to the serious stuff. There's no cramming for it, you can't jump in and be awesome, it takes a long time.

      Most of the other subjects covered in that article can be easily picked up to "beyond the average bear" levels by just reading some books for a few weeks. It's not a surprise then if you're looking for a piece of paper in 4 years and you do not already have some skill in STEM, you go for something easier.

    17. Re:like anything else.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The beauty of math is that once that that problem is solved, you are able to teach the concepts behing the solution to an average human mind without excesive difficulty.

      Exactly..... wrong.
      The beauty of math, is that once the problem is solved, you can teach any average idiot how to go through the motions and arrive at the correct the solution without understanding it.

  2. You can't "prepare" to have a high IQ by KrazyDave · · Score: 2, Insightful

    All of these garbage political/social projects to supposedly increase American kids' achievement in science are just that: feel good garbage. Lowering standards only goes so far until real work and real achievement are required.

    --
    www.chihuahuarescue.com- Help to end dog abuse, abandonment and cruelty
  3. The price of mediocrity by kheldan · · Score: 3, Insightful
    From TFA:

    "If more science graduates are desired, the findings suggest the importance of policies at younger ages that lead students to enter college better prepared (PDF) to study science."

    In other words, this is the price everyone is now paying for public schools sucking so much ass: A generation full of kids who will end up working at McDonalds or something equally meaningless, because they weren't given a decent foundation in grade school and high school.

    --
    Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
    1. Re:The price of mediocrity by HornWumpus · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Not so much. It's just the usual complaints that future PHBs can't be made into engineers no matter how young you start.

      America's top 25% of kids ranks with any nations. We fall flat (on average) because of how badly we do with the mouth breathers. Frankly they don't matter, an educated

      --
      John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
  4. Well, when you have poor teaching by stox · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Arithmetic is hard. A good teacher is worth their weight in gold. I consider myself extremely fortunate that I had a few in my career. Sadly, I don't know how we can change the system to get many more. If I could, Nobel Prize baby!

    --
    "To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
  5. Grades by sandwall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    How about teaching children grades don't matter as much as they are meant to believe. Science undergrad with sub-par (2.7) GPA, still made it into graduate school and currently make six figures (with my degree's). Clearly remember, straight A students crying over B's and other straight A students switching to easier majors to maintain unrealistic GPAs. No one gives a shit about your 4.0 five years after the fact. Actually, no one gives a shit now. Too many believe they're learning the material in the book, they're actually learning *how to learn*

  6. Everyone Wins by SuperCharlie · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Its the last 20 years of coddling and telling kids thay can do anything, handing out prizes to everyone, and boring the crap out of anyone with an extra IQ point above average that makes the mentality that well, of course you can dear, all you have to do is work hard and you can do anything.

    Then you get a classroom full of people who expect a prize every time they do anything.

    / old grump rant..

  7. Why does the WSJ hate American students? by ebno-10db · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Why does the WSJ hate American students? Technically I shouldn't jump to that conclusion, since it is phrased conditionally. FTA:

    “If more science graduates are desired, the findings suggest the importance of policies at younger ages that lead students to enter college better prepared to study science,” the researchers write in the paper.

    Why would we want more STEM graduates? There is no objective evidence that there is a shortage of them, and quite a few indications that, at least in some fields, we have a surplus. Moreover US policy is, and for many years has been, to import STEM students or graduates rather than get Americans interested in these fields. We know this policy is essential because Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, and other very wealthy STEM dropouts tell us it is.

    1. Re:Why does the WSJ hate American students? by ebno-10db · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I can assure you that no company can hire enough programmers.

      Your assurance is not sufficient. If there was that much of a demand, there would be almost no unemployment and salaries would be climbing.

  8. Re:My alma mater by Seumas · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I believe it has to do with electromagnetics and its ability to suss out the wheat from the chaff at alarming rates. You fail EM three times and then you're ready to change to a business major.

    At least, this is the only context I've ever heard it in, so I'm kind of just guessing.

  9. It's Impossible until it becomes Trivial... by Gavin+Scott · · Score: 5, Insightful

    In almost any skill that has to be learned, there's often a fairly rapid and abrupt transition from "I can't do that" to "I CAN do that and since I now know how to it's actually easy".

    I think a lot of people get discouraged when they're unable to get through that transition on their own the first time they try it, and "I can't do that right" can be appear to be an impossible mountain to climb, even if you're not far from the top.

    I think we need to be challenging kids from an early age to learn things that are "hard" so that they become intimately familiar with this progression from impossible to trivial. Too often I see kids these days try something that looks interesting to them a couple times and then decide "nah, that's too hard" and quit.

    It's not specifically teaching perseverance, but more about learning to recognize that progress is almost never linear toward a goal and many times you won't recognize you've reached your goal until you're actually there.

    Additionally, we ought to be able to get better at helping people fight through these places they get stuck, rather than just leaving them with a failing grade in a math class and a feeling that that they're not up to the task. Early recognition of students who are having difficulty and focused tutoring and other help getting through the hard parts to the point that they achieve their needed breakthrough.

    I don't think any undergraduate subject should be so inherently difficult that anyone who can get into the university in the first place shouldn't be able to do well in it.

    G.

  10. Effort vs. Reward by Nethemas+the+Great · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Here's a really crazy thought. A thought based on something that really pissed me off all through my schooling. At the end of the day, kids (which may or may not themselves be stupid) that took stupid, easy courses would earn better grades than those that busted their butt taking challenging courses. An "A" grade in physical education, or introductory algebra should most certainly NOT mean the same thing as an "A" in biology, or Calculus. It's unfair, and discouraging to those students that are truly accomplishing something. Why try so hard when you're surrounded by dumba**es taking slacker classes and pulling off better grades than you.

    --
    Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once ... with negative results.
  11. Re:Post college earnings by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I think a major misconception a lot of people have is that there is a strictly ordered field of easy-->difficult subjects. I'm really cut out for engineering, but I don't think I would be able to go through (say) law school without shooting myself. By the same token, I've met some lawyers that are pretty science-illiterate, I couldn't see them going through a STEM program.

    I think my point is that a lot of people think science and engineering are cool, but then they realize they don't actually like the leg-work that you have to do to make the result. That doesn't mean they're stupid, it just means they have a different niche.

  12. I totally understand in a way... by jo7hs2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I started in college as a comp sci major. I already knew how to program in BASIC, C, and C++ with reasonable proficiency and was excited about the major. However, I had a string of lousy math teachers until high school and struggled with algebra. Oddly, I was always fine with trigonometry and statistics, and I never had issues with the logic part of programming (I'm an attorney now). I was drastically unprepared for college mathematics. Because comp sci majors weren't even allowed to take major-required coursework until they had various math prerequisites, I started behind. After I nearly failed a mid-term in math class I barely understood with a TA I literally could not comprehend, I dropped the class and the major. I retreated to my safe zone in history and eventually ended up in law school.

    While I'm not disappointed with the way things worked out, since my hands give me trouble just with the typing I do for my job now, I do wonder how different my life could have been if one of my math teachers caught on that I was struggling before my senior year of high school. I finally had a good teacher that last year, and she pulled my aside after class and turned a D to an A, but it was too late by then. I just lacked the skills.

    From my perspective, the biggest issue in math education, and really education in general, is grading with no follow up. If a student isn't getting it, failing them doesn't make them get it, and passing them with pity is even worse. This flaw in a lot of education was really hammered home to me in law school when a professor got frustrated her ENTIRE class failed an exam. If the whole class fails, it isn't the students...

    Ironically, I always had amazing science teachers. They were always engaged and excited. I usually got good grades. But, one science teacher was the only teacher I ever had who picked up on the fact that I was being teased and then tried to do something about it. And, my aunt is a science teacher, so I may be biased.

    My rambling point...they need to be catching the kids who are struggling in second to fifth grade. My math issues started with multiplication in elementary school. I was behind, and no one ever caught it because in our school system you could basically still pass if you didn't understand, provided you just got enough questions right and showed effort...and passing was all that mattered.

  13. Math is hard only when the teacher is bad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Math is hard only when the teacher is bad. Known now and since the Greeks. Even the most difficult math can be understood to some good degree by almost any average inteligent person if explained adequately. Even Quantum Mechanics. That is not the problem.

    One problem theaching science is that while math is the language of science, in many places, physics, thermodynamics, elasticity or other science courses are teached more like math courses with science applications than focusing to teach the actual science concepts and solving actual problems.

    Entangling the studends in an algebra, calculus or differential equations mess make lots of people lose the perspective and the simplicity of most science concepts. Sure they need to know all these math things, but more important is to understand the science concepts and know how to solve these science problems with modern tools which mostly take away the prone-to-error math tedious and leaves all the science concepts intact.

    Then if you want to be sure they still know how to solve evil multivariate differential equations or simplify page full algebraic expressions and such, do a math exam but don't make things that are easy hard with no benefit... at all.

  14. Obligatory XKCD by rwa2 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    http://xkcd.com/435/

    Up through Engineering math isn't that bad, as long as you don't fall behind the rest of the class.

    Good math classes are self-paced (more so than most other subjects, since there are so many dependencies), so everyone can rise to their level of ability.

  15. Effort is its own Reward by slew · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Rather than be pissed-off, you should see school for what it really is, not a competition between students, but an opportunity to get educated.

    If you look back at it, it's rather bizzare to think of education as a contest. So if you happened to be so smart that you didn't have to study and you still got better grades than everyone else, would that matter a bit to your preparation for a future college course (or life). Or in contrast, finding the best opportunities to put in your best effort regardless of the competition, you will perhaps learn better your own strengths and weaknesses as preparation for the future.

    Life is really what you make of it. It generally is not what everyone else is doing (or as some might suggest, a race to die with the most ribbons and toys, or that success requires others to fail). The truth is that eventually, nobody really truly cares what you did or even what you are doing, so who are you trying to impress? The answer is generally yourself, so you might as well try as hard as will make you happy or you will live to regret it (a fact that many looking back who do not try as hard as they could will often attest to).