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Calculus, what the fuck? (Studying too) FINAL UPDATE
urahonky
Cynical Old ManRegistered User regular
Cynical Old ManRegistered User regular
So I've somehow managed to climb the math ladder to Calculus II (in college) and I just can't seem to grasp really anything. The instructor (as are all math instructors at this fucking university) is completely useless to me. I can't understand a damn word he is saying, and he writes just fast enough to where I have to keep up with him in my notes, and I can't pay attention to what he's doing or saying.
I just got back my second exam, and it was a fucking 38 out of 100 (Lowest grade in the class, I'm sure) and everyone around me got about a 90+ on it. So obviously I'm doing something wrong. I studied about 5-6 hours on Monday, and then another 3 hours on Tuesday then went in and took the test. I felt pretty indifferent about it, but I never expected to get such a low score.
Now here's my problem. I know some of you guys are smart as hell, and I was wondering: HOW THE HELL DO YOU STUDY FOR MATH?! I lack absolute studying skills. I never had to study for any of my other exams in other classes up until this class (I'm in my Junior year now). Apparently what I was doing was completely wrong.
(I'm sorry if this isn't entirely coherent, as I'm still pretty pissed off at myself.)
Do you guys have any study tips at all? I'm so lost in the material I can't seem to shake the feeling that I'm going to get an F in this class and bring down my GPA. Please help.
e: Dance Commander brings a good point: Calculus II (at my university) is mainly on integrals. I thought I had everything down, but got hit hard with this exam. Looks like I don't know shit about "Improper" integrals. I do it correctly on the odd problems (by checking the back) but I miss almost every single even one somehow.
e2: Check out the last post for the grade!
I just got back my second exam, and it was a fucking 38 out of 100 (Lowest grade in the class, I'm sure) and everyone around me got about a 90+ on it. So obviously I'm doing something wrong. I studied about 5-6 hours on Monday, and then another 3 hours on Tuesday then went in and took the test. I felt pretty indifferent about it, but I never expected to get such a low score.
Now here's my problem. I know some of you guys are smart as hell, and I was wondering: HOW THE HELL DO YOU STUDY FOR MATH?! I lack absolute studying skills. I never had to study for any of my other exams in other classes up until this class (I'm in my Junior year now). Apparently what I was doing was completely wrong.
(I'm sorry if this isn't entirely coherent, as I'm still pretty pissed off at myself.)
Do you guys have any study tips at all? I'm so lost in the material I can't seem to shake the feeling that I'm going to get an F in this class and bring down my GPA. Please help.
e: Dance Commander brings a good point: Calculus II (at my university) is mainly on integrals. I thought I had everything down, but got hit hard with this exam. Looks like I don't know shit about "Improper" integrals. I do it correctly on the odd problems (by checking the back) but I miss almost every single even one somehow.
e2: Check out the last post for the grade!
urahonky on
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However, I was bad at calc 2, so take this advice with a grain of salt.
I just... Don't know what I'm doing apparently.
I find that a lot of students have an almost compulsive need to take really freakishly comprehensive notes. All that shit is in the book. Don't write it down, or at least don't write down everything. Pay attention while you have the teacher there and can ask questions, and then look at the book later if you need to review. On that note, don't be afraid to ask questions!
That's the most general advice I can give you, I guess.
I'll give that a shot. 90% of the time my notes are useless anyway, since I don't know what I'm doing on them.
Asking questions is useless to this teacher. He pretty much makes you feel like an idiot when you ask a question.
This is him, by the way. I know that site isn't always a good gauge on how good a teacher is, but everything stated is pretty much on the spot about this guy.
Unfortunately I don't have any magical special studying tips. The fact that you did the homework repeatedly until you could do it probably indicates that maybe you were focusing too much on learning specific problems instead of learning the general principles behind them -- which seems to be supported by the test performance.
Try finding and doing a bunch of other practice/sample problems on the same topics instead of just repeating the homework over and over. This would hopefully help to stress the more general ideas. I had that problem in Chem 1 in college and I initially focused way too much on specific problems. Then when it came to the test I failed it because I couldn't generalize them.
And the TA is supposedly helpful. However, he's always swarmed by 10 other students in class. It seems like instead of helping, he gives answers. Which is good in some ways, but I'd rather find out how to do a problem.
Seriously, it helps a shit ton. If you work as many problems as you can then it should just help a lot.
Don't just go over past homework solutions and past exam solutions. It doesn't really help. Work out the problem and then look at the solution and then work a similar problem to it.
I need to basically ace the final to pass with a C now. I got a 73 on the first exam, and a 38 on this one. My odds aren't looking very good right now.
Thanks for the help thus far guys, please keep them coming. Any tips at all (what to do the night before... Any foods or something that can help).
Good night's sleep and whatnot.
Also, try to be in the same state of mind during the test that you are during studying. I mean, don't drastically change anything to take the test. Studies have shown that the mind is better at recalling things that are learning in a similar situation/mindframe. So try not to be drunk when you study or do your homework -- or alternatively, if you are then be drunk during the test.
You really only get better by doing different problems without help, or only enough help to get you over a hump (and then reworking the problem without looking up help). You're not alone, though -- I had a hell of a time in Calc 2 and got a C in the class, even though I thought I was doing horribly in the class. Turns out a lot of students were also doing poorly, and he couldn't fail everyone. Professor was pretty similar, too -- spent the entire class going over weird math things, getting confused by his own handwriting, and mocking anyone who asked questions. He'd show up, start writing on the board, and talking to the board, so he never saw a raised hand.
Do every problem in the book that you have answers for, and also practice the example problems your professor did during class.
If you come across a problem that stumps you or a concept you don't understand, go to the professor's office hours. I really can't stress how helpful this can be. Professors will gladly help you out, and it will let the professor get to know you and know you're trying. And usually other students are there, too -- you'll probably find a good study partner.
Paul's Online Math Notes
Basically, this is a professor at the University I go to. I post this link almost every time someone asks for help here, but only because it's very useful and has helped many people in the past. It's basically all of the courses he teaches or has taught in the past, all online, with fairly detailed notes and examples. This guy is really good and knows his stuff, and his notes helped me tremendously in Calc III and Diff Eq. Hopefully you can find something there that will help you out as well.
Oculus: TheBigDookie | XBL: Dook | NNID: BigDookie
Do all the assigned homework, as well as a few unassigned problems.
Obtain as many exams from past courses as possible, and practice on some with these. Try to get the problems right, but if you cant, dont worry. I mainly used previous exams to get an idea of the pacing of the test. Unless each exam is radically different, you should be able to get an idea of the time required for each problem of the test. Many professors like to reuse old exams by simply changing/rearranging the variables and numbers of each problem, but keep the pacing relatively the same.
Thats pretty much what I did. Hope it helps
It's got class notes for a bunch of college-level math courses. It's very well explained and there's lots of examples. There's also a section on how to study math in the Extras.
Nintendo Network ID: PhysiMarc
when you're in class, write down the problems... if you get an "a-ha!" moment, write down whatever it is that just clicked, that just made sense to you (I often had those with math but forgot to write them down so I'd have to muddle through a dozen questions before it came back to me)
are there any other professors who teach this class? maybe you can sit in on their lectures and see if it makes more sense to you that way
Seriously, thanks for that link. I'll be reading through this and hopefully helping myself out with this.
(Also thanks Big Dookie as well).
I'd love to go and see the professor, but every time I do he makes me feel like an idiot. He'll generally repeat the same thing over and over again until I act like I understand. (Happened before, and many students in the class say the same thing).
I'll try the new note taking scheme you guys are recommending. Keeping up with him on the board is almost entirely useless, and I use the solutions manual to help me learn the odd problems, and I copy those "ideas" over to the new one. I thought it was helping me learn, but obviously not.
If worst comes to worst, I'll try and get a tutor. I'm kinda low on cash, but I'd rather not have to retake my Calc classes because I'm an idiot.
Volumes (Fuck that shit)
Surface area (connected with the above)
Partial Fractions (ugh... I think I have the basic idea, but it's too confusing for me for some reason)
and
Improper integrals. For some reason I almost always find an answer even if the thing is divergent. I can't figure out how to find out if it is convergent/divergent.
Like I said earlier, try to find out if your school has a free student run tutoring option. Many do and it would be helpful to at least try it out before going to a paid tutor. Generally it's students who have done well in the class/subject they're tutoring, and odds are they've done it recently.
The math help room only goes up to Calculus I at my university.
I'll look online for other tests
I had a lot of problems with calculus, too. I'm not bad at math: I did better than most at stuff like linear algebra, statistics, discrete math, etc., but calculus always fucked me up.
So for Calc II, I took the class over the summer at a different university (one near my parents' house) and transfered the credits over.
Some colleges (mine!) will not have transferred credits affect your GPA as long as you pass. I got a C in Calc II, same as Calc I, but it didn't fuck up my GPA any further.
Although that might be worth it if I don't have to retake my calc classes.
Memory? What's that really got to do with math? All of math is just understanding concepts through reasoning, even calculus. Get down to the bare bones of what is going on. Understand that with an integral you are finding the area of a function over a certain interval. Use that to get a volume by multiplying your area by a height. If you are trying to get through math with memorization in mind, you will do poorly, especially in calculus.
That's weird... it says on the site it goes up to MTH 230 which the course description says is Calc II. http://www.wright.edu/uc/mlc/current.html
In any case, try the general tutoring place: http://www.wright.edu/uc/tutor/ They may be able to help you find a math tutor. It's not free (unless you're a freshman), but it's only like $6/hour which is going to be cheaper than any independent tutor.
Haha, it's funny you say that. My instructor explains (every day) that he doesn't care for "understanding" the material, it's more about memorization than anything. He tells us to memorize it without actually explaining anything, which is what I started to try and do. Obviously failing, of course.
Huh, you're right. For some reason I thought Calc II was 231 for some reason.
I'll also try and contact that tutor place. Anything is better than my current instructor.
Oculus: TheBigDookie | XBL: Dook | NNID: BigDookie
Really, the variety is what's going to help. You might know how to do something backwards and forwards, but find yourself immediately lost when someone throws in some kind of "twist" to mix things up a little.
If it's any consolation, Calc II is usually seen as the hardest. Hopefully if you have to take Calc III, you'll find it easier. (Also, depending on where your curriculum ends, you might enjoy the end of Calc II a lot better. Mine included the beginnings of vectors and threespace, which is really pretty simple once you grasp the concept).
I'll post some later. Unfortunately I'm at work and didn't bring my book in with me.
Looking at the curriculum Calc III includes vectors/threespace. That will be my final Calculus class as well.
Yeah, the reason I was doing the same ones over and over again is because for his exams, he will take the homework problems and slightly modify them and have us do them. So I assumed that I should do the homework ones over and over.
Obviously variety would have been better it seems.
Probably without requiring most of the knowledge you obtained in calc 2. It is my personal opinion that calc 2 classes(in a calc 1-3 followed by DEs setup that seems pretty typical)are designed around being the "filter" class
The class is the filter, and the science and math majors who can't hack it are the little bits of fail that get trapped and don't pass through. USUALLY the difficulty drops dramatically with calc 3 and beyond
Oh and just to flash my creds *flashes physics degree*
Unfortunately my studying advice is pretty typical. Read the damned book. I mean sit down and READ it, page by page, picture by picture, not advancing until you understand everything, every figure, and every equation. You ALSO need to practice, just raw practice of doing problems. Most people just do one or the other(read or practice)
If you can follow a heuristic(right word? Algorithm?)to solve a particular problem from your book, cool, but if that's all you can do, you can consider yourself rightly fucked on a test where the teacher wants to test your understanding of math, not your ability to do the same thing over and over(well ok they're testing that too)
If you just read the book then you'll be in the hilarious situation of knowing what to do but not how to do it right
Also study old tests. Weren't so hot at one section but it's over now so no worries? Oh yes worries, loads of worries. That's another mistake people make
I will say this - if your class is like many Calc II classes, the next thing you'll be getting into will likely be Sequences and Infinite Series, and you'll likely stay on that subject until near the end of the semester. This can be good and bad. Bad, because it can be fairly tough in its own way. Good, because it's basically a complete departure from anything you've done in Calculus up until now, at least until you get past the convergence/divergence tests and start seeing how they relate with integrals and stuff. So even if you suck at integration, you can still be a pro at Infinite Series if you study hard.
Oculus: TheBigDookie | XBL: Dook | NNID: BigDookie
I'm going for Computer Science. Yeah I definitely need to get the convergent/divergent down. I don't know why I have so many problems with them. But normally I get about a 16-18/20 on my homework, but with the improper integration I got 12/20. I just did stuff completely wrong, that seemed right to me at the time.
Oculus: TheBigDookie | XBL: Dook | NNID: BigDookie