Thanks for writing this. This puts some of my experience in perspective. When I was in 11th grade, I was doing very poorly in math: I was barely scraping through the exams and my math teacher told my parents that I would not be cut out for college in engineering or physical sciences. But come 12th grade, I was on top of the class without even breaking a sweat; even though the math got much harder and the math teacher was the same. Now, I’m doing a PhD in physics.
I think an important factor in my case was finding friends who were also genuinely curious about math, instead of just wanting to get through the exams.
But I still think there were a lot of hidden variables that governed this transition that I’m still unaware of. For example, friends cannot explain all of it as I had many of the same friends in 12th grade as well. “Increased motivation” is not really an explanation. Learning more deeply—from different sources and in interesting contexts—are significantly causally linked with more motivation.
Thanks for writing this. This puts some of my experience in perspective. When I was in 11th grade, I was doing very poorly in math: I was barely scraping through the exams and my math teacher told my parents that I would not be cut out for college in engineering or physical sciences. But come 12th grade, I was on top of the class without even breaking a sweat; even though the math got much harder and the math teacher was the same. Now, I’m doing a PhD in physics.
I think an important factor in my case was finding friends who were also genuinely curious about math, instead of just wanting to get through the exams.
But I still think there were a lot of hidden variables that governed this transition that I’m still unaware of. For example, friends cannot explain all of it as I had many of the same friends in 12th grade as well. “Increased motivation” is not really an explanation. Learning more deeply—from different sources and in interesting contexts—are significantly causally linked with more motivation.