alt-left math

Traditional math questions alt-right politicians blame for their bad or negative influence on students, which create math anxiety or instill the fear factor in them.

In most cases, semi-numerate politicians themselves are clueless how to solve these alt-left math questions, who often attribute the high innumeracy rate among certain racial or religious groups to pure laziness and poor study habits.

by MathPlus April 18, 2018

Weapons of Math Persuasion

The tools you need to get the most mathophobic student or adult not to give up on the most disliked school subject even if it appears that they were not born with the “mathematical gene.”

Pep talks, study tips, showers of praise, and no condemnation for failures are some common weapons of math persuasion successful teachers use to help students achieve a decent level of mathematical proficiency.

by MathPlus January 30, 2018

math pro bono

A public service (that usually lasts all year) in which you voluntarily take time out of your day to help your buddy pass math class. Most common math pro bono's involve one American student and the foreign kid he's grown fond of and befriended.

Foreign Kid: "Yo dude I don't get this shit! What the fuck is teach talking about when he says cosine of 30 degrees?"

American Kid: "Get your calculator. All you gotta do is put in 'cos(30degrees)' and you'll get '0.866025404'. Simple dude. Are you going to be my math pro bono all damn year?"

Foreign Kid: "Yeah dude, we don't do math in my country."

by westfalia January 12, 2010

Drill-and-Kill Math

A teaching format that effectively prepares students to the test: worked examples followed by lots of practice on similar questions—algorithmic mastery over conceptual fluency.

Average teachers just love drill-and-kill math, because it gives oft-low self-esteem kids the illusion that they've mastered the concepts—teachers are happy, students gain self-confidence, and parents are pleased with the decent grades.

by MathPlus April 18, 2017

North Korea Math

A Communist version of Singapore Math—which is rehashed from the world's best math curriculums—to brainwash students of the power of math in propelling North Korea into a nuclear power.

Math educators believe that if North Korean students were to take part in international comparative studies like PISA and TIMSS, it wouldn't be surprising that they'd rank among the top ten, thanks to the high standard of North Korea math.

by MathPlus July 12, 2017

Doom-and-Gloom Math

The hypothesis that a large proportion of the people in the developed world would lack the critical thinking and quantitative skills required of a 21st-century citizen, because the politics of nativism, populism, and racism plaguing their societies have directly or indirectly brainwashed or radicalized them.

Thanks to Trumpism or right-wing politics, clothed under white supremacism or white Christian nationalism, millions of adults and children have fallen victims to the gospel of doom-and-gloom math, who blame millions of immigrants and refugees for stealing their blue-and white-collar jobs and for invading the promised land of their forefathers (who did the same thing to Native Americans).

by MathPlus April 28, 2023

Yo-Yo Math

When schools or states are willing to change their textbooks every other year, as publishers tempt teachers with free resources (and bribe them with airline and cruise tickets).

Getting an entire state to adopt a publisher's set of textbooks is worth millions of dollars, so the sales and marketing personnel would go all out to play yo-yo math with decision makers to get them to choose their titles over those of their competitors.

by MathPlus July 26, 2017