📕 Part 1: Math

This episode's vocabulary

Have a head for sth (idiom) - to have the mental ability to do something well.

Glaze over - if your eyes glaze or glaze over, they stay still and stop showing any emotion because you are bored or tired or have stopped listening.

Atrophy (verb) - (of a part of the body) to be reduced in size and therefore strength, or, more generally, to become weaker.

Arithmetic (noun) - calculations involving adding and multiplying, etc. numbers.

Torturous (adj.) - involving a lot of suffering or difficulty.

Sum (noun) - a calculation, especially a simple one, using such processes as adding, taking away, multiplying, or dividing.

Times table (noun) - multiplication table.

Rote learning - learning something in order to be able to repeat it from memory, rather than in order to understand it.

Vice versa (adverb) - used to say that what you have just said is also true in the opposite order.

Precise (adj.) - exact and accurate.

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Questions and Answers

M: Rory, do like math?

R: No, and I probably never will. I think numbers are just too abstract for me and I don't really understand them. I understand that they're important. I get that. But they will never be my thing. It's something that I share with my mom, not really having a head for numbers.

M: Is math difficult to learn?

R: Extremely. I can't describe how it feels to any great degree of accuracy, but I can just feel my eyes glazing over and my soul begs for all to end whenever I encounter math or any mathematical equation. I think it's just the effort of creating the abstractions in my head. I can do this with words, like I'm good with language, but I can't do it with numbers. That area of my brain seems to have completely atrophied by now.

M: Do you think math is hard?

R: Well, for me personally, yes, but I didn't have terribly good math teachers when I was younger. That wasn't their fault entirely because I wasn't a good student either. And the whole situation of math education just wasn't well suited to me learning it, to be honest with you. More generally, though, at least at the basic levels of arithmetic, it shouldn't be so torturous for people, especially young people in smaller classes like you can do some sums in your head, for example.

M: When did you start learning math?

R: Oh, primary one, I think. That's our equivalent to the first grade. We had to learn times tables by heart and do long division. Not in primary one. I think that times tables came a little bit later, but we started doing like basic addition and subtraction in primary one. But it was all learning by rote and it was all very dull and it was useful for basic arithmetic with money and things. But beyond that, it wasn't terribly... We didn't have much utility.

M: Who taught you math?

R: Oh, my teachers mainly. My mum and dad tried to help, but I think they were as frustrated as I was by the end of it, to be honest. The information just wasn't digestible, no matter which route we took. So I think this was why rote learning was basically the only the only route that we could take.

M: Did you usually use a calculator?

R: Usually? I always use one for everything more than basic sums that I can't do in my head. And I don't even bother with the formula, frankly. I just sort of... Either I'll find some sort of equations website online that can do more advanced formula or I'll ask a friend. I know a lot of math teachers. Every English teacher should know a math teacher and vice versa. That's really useful.

M: Rory, thank you so much for your precise mathematical* answers.

R: Hopefully, hopefully everything adds up or added up.

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Discussion

M: Yes, dear listener. So when you talk about math, math, math or mathematics? What's going on?

R: Who cares? It's all the same. No. Math, math in America, math in the UK and mathematics is the formal term for everything connected to this.

M: Ok, so in the UK, what do I say?

R: Math.

M: Math? With the "s". Math. Yeah.

R: Well, yeah, but if you have like, if you're from certain areas of England, for example, you say math with a sound.

M: Math. And it's usually capitalized because it's the name of the subject, like science, history, always capital, big letter. So when you talk about this math, you should use topical vocabulary. Vocabulary specific to mathematics. For example, Rory told us equations.

R: Equations and formula.

M: Yeah. Like many formula.

R: Yeah. I'm really the worst person to talk about this at all in general because like...

M: No, you took the exam. Rory, come on, man up. You took the exam. You do know some math.

R: Well, I don't know the difference with equations and formula. Like there are things. I don't know what they are. I use them to mean a sequence of numbers or characters. My guess would be that equations are things that you use to make calculations and formula are sort of general algorithms for carrying out equations. That's my closest guess. I don't know if that's true.

M: Yeah, but like when you talk about mathematics, we talk about doing sums and during your math classes, you do sums. Like two plus six equals what... This is sum. 20 plus 20, it's a sum and we do sums

R: So usually it's to talk about the short equations, easy ones to do, but also the sum is a technical mathematical term for the total of something. So actually when you find the sum of something, that means that you add everything together. See, I did learn some things on my math course. But none of it's useful.

M: Wow. It's impressive.

R: It's not.

M: But you got accepted, right, for this interview.

R: I did, but I'm teaching like primary school math, so that's really easy.

M: Yeah, but you should, you should be beyond their level. So you should know much more than primary kids to teach them. Right. And then when you do this sums, we have divisions, additions and subtractions. So for example, two plus two... So if I go with two plus two, this is an addition. Right. So additions. Divisions would be= six divided by three.

R: Which is two.

M: Yeah. And then subtraction.

R: It's when you take one amount away from another amount.

M: So these are all different sums.

R: But these are like really basic ones. You learn how to do these in primary school.

M: Well, normally.

R: Except for, except for long division, which is when you divide huge numbers, I think. Isn't it? Or you divide a number by a number that is actually bigger than it, something like that. It's very complicated. I don't want to do it.

M: Yeah. And we're talking about the basic level of arithmetic. Arithmetic is another synonym for mathematics.

R: Yeah. It's like doing the numbers in your head basically.

M: Yeah. And you can do the numbers in your head. Like I'm good at doing the numbers in my head or doing sums in my head, or I use a calculator to do basic sums. Like I always use a calculator. So you do calculations, you calculate. Right. You can say just oh I can't do basic sums in my head, I have to use a calculator. I don't even bother with the formula. Formula. Right.

R: Yes. And if you don't bother with something that means you don't do it.

M: And at school Rory learnt times tables.

R: Yeah.

M: Times tables, right?

R: Times tables, which is just like you learn like it's like one times and then it's usually one to ten. It used to be one to twelve I think, because in the UK we used to have a different money system. And then things changed in the nineteen seventies I think. And you had to relearn how to do it.

M: Anyway. Just again, go to Google images and type in times tables. And the colocation is to learn time tables. And Rory did it by rote.

R: Yes. Which just means that you learn it by heart and repeating it again and again and again until you die from boredom.

M: Yes, yeah. I think everybody did that at school because they send you off to summer holidays and they say who you have to learn times tables, which was torturous for many people.

R: Did they do that? Yes.

M: Oh yeah. For the whole summer.

R: If something is torturous it just means that it's like torture.

M: Like torture people, you inflict pain on them. So learning times tables by heart is torturous or you can say mathematics is torturous for me. So this is like it gives me pain, basically. And you can say that math is not my thing, right. And, Rory, you did say that numbers are not my thing.

R: Yeah. So if something is not your thing then it just means that you're not into it. It's not something that's very interesting for you.

M: Yeah, it's my thing, you know. Or you can say I don't have a head for numbers.

R: Exactly. If you don't have a head for numbers that it means that you're not very good at, well, making calculations in your head for lack of a better term.

M: Yeah, but like saying I'm not good at numbers is boring. So you can say I don't have a head for numbers. It's my thing. And this part of brain which is responsible for calculations in Rory's head is now atrophied.

R: So, yeah, if something is atrophied, then it just means that it, well, what's the word. It's died basically. So if your muscles atrophy, it means that they shrink and become less useful than they used to.

M: Mhm. So muscles can atrophy and parts of your brain can atrophy. Or Rory said that this area of my brain has atrophied. Right. So present perfect.

R: Exactly.

M: And also, when you talk about mathematics, you can say that, oh, when I was learning math, I felt my eyes glazing over and my soul was begging for it to end.

R: Basically.

M: This is like where you got very poetical, Rory. Right?

R: Yeah. Well, if your eyes glaze over, it just means that you stop paying attention to whatever it is someone is saying to you and you can just.. Your eyes just stay in the same position. They don't move. They just stay fixed because you're not really looking at what, intently at the other person while they are speaking to you.

M: Mhm. Oh, wow. Like some desserts have this glazing.

R: Um, yeah. It's kind of a similar description of how your eyes look.

M: Mhm. Ok. Yeah. So my eyes started glazing over and my soul begs for it to end.

R: My soul does beg for it to end.

M: Yes. So we love math on this podcast. But again, if you are good at math, if you enjoy math, so use some positive language. I love mathematics. Mathematics is everywhere. It's crucial* importance to every soul on earth. Yeah. And Rory actually did a very difficult math exam. Rory, tell us about it. How good you are.

R: I know, it was horrible. I didn't like it at all. I had to do things like, it wasn't just long division and calculating percentages, which I can sort of do in my head It was also things like algebra, calculating the volume of a cube. Well, no, you can calculate the volume of the cube. That's easy, but you had to calculate the volume of a cone, although admittedly calculating volumes of things is not difficult because there are a formula for that and they're always the same. They're unchanging. But there are other things that were more abstract, like finding out the lengths and directions of lines and in 3D shapes and things like... Things that you will never need, basically. And I was like, why do I need to understand this, if I'm going to teach young people? I don't get it, but whatever, it's there now.

M: Yes. So well done, Rory. And I remember that you did ask for some help on Facebook. Like oh people please help me out with this.

R: It is the only reason I passed is because of help from other people. So this is, what's the word...

M: Teamwork.

R: Yeah. It's like a great example of how teamwork should function.

M: Yes. So Rory is smart.

R: I'm not, I'm not smart. I'm really stupid.

M: Rory, you used to teach GMAT, OK. And GMAT is the monster of all exams with all this algebra and geometry and difficult sums.

R: Yeah, but I never taught people how to do any of that. I expected them to know that themselves because they should have learned this in high school. Sort of like how I should have learned it in high school. But didn't. And I always said like you've employed me as an English teacher. I'm not employed as a math teacher. Those are two very different things.

M: True. So we are super enthusiastic about math. And I think on this high note. Bye!

R: Bye!

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