[NeilCJames]

While funny, that is the worst advertisement for learning math I have ever read. If you are of anywhere near normal intelligence, and put in anywhere near normal effort and don't 'get math', your parents, teachers, superintendents, school boards, and departments of education sucked, not you.

Applied math is about finding, stating and solving problems. Strategy instead of tactics. Writing a cookbook, not reading one. Teaching mathematics-as-recipes is the reason most people don't "get" math, even if they score decent grades in school. It is the reason they don't think they will use math in "real life"--because they learnt a bunch of equations, and didn't learn what they mean, because they don't need to know what the equations mean to pass the exam. So, because the exam sucks, and teachers have to teach to the standard exam, the teaching sucks, students have to study textbooks that suck, do homework problems that suck, and take tests that suck. Imagine that: Most of the students end up sucking! Instead of fixing it, let's have yet another round of blame the victim!

[wkdown]

I wouldn't blanket blame the teachers/etc because a lot of students feel if they don't get it right away, they dismiss it out of hand and don't give it much effort after that. Prof Hawking can't teach a 3yr old long division.