Any university class can be hard.  I’ve had impossible amounts of information to memorize in biology, tricky logic questions in computer science, and vague and overarching questions in sociology finals.  Despite these hard exams though, one subject still stands above and beyond the rest in terms of the torture it entails come exam time: Math.  In this article, I explore some of the reasons why math can be so difficult to succeed in, and some techniques you can use to avoid the hellish depths of a failed exam.

Why is math so hard?

If we’re going to determine how to make math easy (or easier at least), the first step must be to determine what makes math so hard in the first place.  Several reasons readily come to mind:

1. Math relies more heavily on conceptual / analogical reasoning than other subjects.  Sure, you can be asked to draw simple links between material in a psychology exam, but in math it’s all about linking together these vague formal concepts in class.  And compared to a pure memorization exercise, actually thinking for yourself can be quite hard to do, in large part because it’s something that you don’t practice in every class.
   
   The solution?  Hate to say it, but as my math teacher always used to say “proper practice makes perfect”.  If all else fails at a particular subject, brute forcing your way through the material by devoting large chunks of time to go over what was presented, figuring out how it all works, and then generalizing to new material is a blunt but effective approach to success.
   
   
2. Most people aren’t experts in math.  For some reason, math just doesn’t seem to be a subject that most people like in high school.  In fact, the telltale signs of an unpleasant university experience in a particular course can often be observed in high school.  Although the math taught at university is presented at an accelerated pace to that of high school math, it nevertheless is usually instructed from an initial point which is common across all high schools.  This means that at the very least, the first math class you take should have some material repetition – usually in the form of a condensed version of your high school math class taught over a period of one or two weeks.  This might not seem like much, but when you think about it, two weeks out of the twelve or thirteen which comprise a typical university semester equals nearly 15% of the material you’d typically be required to learn. 
   
   Moreover, math is by and large a cumulative subject.  Although the main focus of the material may move on to more sophisticated topics like partial derivatives or Poisson distributions, the fundamental operations like factoring, log-transforming, and even basic arithmetical operations remain critically important to success, and you need to have them down pat (if you’re a high school student reading this, HEED THIS WARNING!).  Thus, not knowing these basics well can prevent you from even learning from the examples the professor gives in lecture and from the questions listed in the book, and can also hold you back from answering questions for which you understand the more sophisticated material but can’t get around how to compute 4^3 = e^x.  When we say “not knowing the basics” though, we don’t just mean not remembering how to calculate a cosine.   We mean do you know how to do it perfectly, arms tied behind your back, while dangling upside down over a pool of sharks with head-mounted lasers.  If your answer to this is no, then you should definitely invest in some time practicing all the basics up to the class, including your basic arithmetic.  Sure, calculators are often available, but if you want speed it’s sometimes faster to be able to do those simple two-digit multiplications in your own head.  And yes, surprisingly people are able to improve these basic math abilities very substantially.  Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University routinely improve the math expertise of their undergraduates via practice and psychological theory, and if you don’t happen to be attending this school, you can get largely the same benefits by a little self practice with programs like “Mind Games” for the Nintendo DS.
   
   
3. Most people don’t practice enough.  How much time do you spend preparing for a math test per week?  Two hours?  Five?  I’m not exaggerating here when I say that when I had a hard math class, I spent four hours per day for the entire semester preparing for it.  That may seem excessive… Heck, I’ll admit that it was, but I ended up doing better than most other students because of it.  And in retrospect, part of that time was just being used to reinforce the basic math skills that I hadn’t really polished back in high school.  The bottom line though is that practice makes perfect, and this can’t be emphasized enough in math.
   

   Admittedly, part of the problem in a math course is that practice is just so arduous.  If you take psychology, you may study for eight hours a week but it doesn’t seem like that much because the material is interesting – who doesn’t want to know why Freud thinks we all want to have sex with our parents?  Math on the other hand…  To an extent, it would be wise to try to get interested in the math that you’re doing.  See the beauty that it contains.  However, this can be hard to do when you’re only taking the course because it’s a requirement for your program..  In these cases, there’s not much we can say except that lots of hard work does pay off.  Think of it like getting into shape after Christmas holidays.  It’s hard to eat right every day and go to the gym when it’s cold outside and there’s some chocolate fondue left over in your fridge.  But if you keep it up, soon the pounds will be shed – slowly, but surely.  So sometimes you just have to bite the bullet and tough it out if you really want to succeed, keep that GPA high, and win those scholarships that will keep you out of debt and soaring academically higher than ever before. 

4. Math anxiety.  This one is a killer, and a very vicious circle.  Math is hard.  You’re scared of math.  You don’t know an answer.  You panic, remember math is hard and you’re scared, and then stay in this feedback loop while time is ticking away.  How can this problem be avoided? 
   
   First, you need to get confident.  Yes, math is hard, but I’ve practiced and done my best to prepare, and I should at the very least be able to get a reasonable mark on the exam.  Start the ball rolling right.  Then, on the test, help build a little confidence by answering the one or two easy questions that professors’ pepper through their tests like gold coins in dark medieval dungeons.  Remember, points are points, and getting a few quickly at the start can help you establish the fact that the outcome of this test will not be fatal.  Subsequently, try to cycle through the questions in terms of their difficulty, and not how the professor laid out the exam.  Don’t just follow the structure they deviously randomized before the class.  Capitalize on the questions you know how to answer best first, before devoting significant time to the other questions.  I’ve frequently been able to answer 30-40% of an exam in a perfect or near perfect manner in less than 20% of the total allotted time just by doing what’s easy and what I know, leaving lots of time to explore other strategies for the remaining part of the exam. 

The UniversityAdvice.com bottom line:

Math is a hard subject.  To an extent, there is no way to by-pass investing lots of time and hard work (read: suffering, for some) if you really do want to succeed.  But by focusing on some extraneous problems many people have with math, such as improving your basic math abilities and eliminating your math anxiety, you can help make the most of your intense study sessions and no longer feel like you’re in hell whenever you’re writing a math test.

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