Have I Failed as a Teacher?

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Today we discuss some of the controversies surrounding my alst video where 85% percent of all my students failed. Let's take a look at all the sides and perspectives, shall we?
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0:00 Intro
1:41 Helplessness
2:34 Very Mean Comments
7:32 The Student's POV
11:09 The Harshness of Teaching
12:43 I Wish I knew About this as a Student
17:22 The Biggest Hurdle to Overcome
22:55 You Don't want to Miss Out on this Part...

[@PapaFlammy69]

*_Let me know your thoughts! Love ya'll

[@runningn2life818]

You could be drowning them in work. I know you want to provide every resource possible to them and that is entirely great and I thrive with that level of teaching, but maybe try giving very streamlined homework that is 5-8 questions that covers as much as it can and grade harshly on it and make your students redo it until they fully understand that very small sample of work that way you can test fundamentals. This might help more than you think. It also may not they could just be lazy little shits, but I bet probably 40% of the class is capable of passing with help and 60% is hopeless. That has worked for me in the past though and I'd honestly like to know if it was a fluke but I haven't had the chance to test it.

[@a7xmegadeth26]

Based on what you've said it seems unlikely that any of this is your fault. It sounds like a mix of student + policy issues. Some things that might help - Do the students have any avenue to speak with you privately about any issues they are having with the course work (there's a chance they might feel embarrassed to ask in front of other classmates)? An exercise you could maybe try (if you haven't already) is having the students work through the problem as a class, with minimal input from yourself - let them make mistakes, and discuss. This might help them get their abstract thinking working a bit. Another thing that might help is if there's any way you can verify their understanding of the content throughout the course so that way you can see what students are struggling with - If they're not understanding some of the basic concepts of the course near the start, they're unlikely to catch up by the end. Are you able to discuss with teachers from other classes how these students are doing academically? Is this a universal issue with this group, or are they only struggling in your class? If they're only struggling in your class, maybe the other teachers have some insight with how to best connect with the students. Honestly most of this stuff should be done by the students themselves (asking for help, working through problems as a group, speaking up if something doesn't make sense). But sometimes there's factors holding them back from doing so. Not sure if any of this would be helpful as I am not a teacher (Bio student), and there might be some differences in teaching/student culture.

[@PapaFlammy69]

The assignments are planned for about 4 weeks

[@quezzert]

Hi Flammy! I'm a grade 12 student in Australia, doing the highest level of math available in school. I'll be honest, my class is full of lazy shits too, but I'd never pin that on my teacher. If the others in the class cared, they'd take the initiative and ask questions, do the exercises you put out, or God forbid actually try in class. Sometimes, there's just nothing you can do. My only suggestion would be to put less work out, or to reassure them that it's okay if they don't attempt all of it. It sounds like with the current situation of the class, it can only go up from here, and even if they just made an attempt at one piece of homework you assigned it would be a step in the right direction. I know that when I see a piece of homework that looks really challenging, I don't even try it and just go do something else, so maybe you can try to make it seem less intimidating. I'm talking out of my ass here but comments help the algorithm so why not 🤷‍♂

[@alexdilena2520]

Have you considered an exam bank? Offer some 40 or so problems and present a subset on an exam. They may be more motivated to study if they know that the questions from the review will appear, almost exactly, on the exam. If presented in this way maybe they will be more encouraged to solve all the problems. You can manage the difficulty by increasing the pool of problems you provide. Even a lazy student will attempt to look at all the solutions.

[@franciscoreyes7370]

I've been teaching lower division college math for the last 5 years. About half the students come to class (other instructors have the same or worse attendance), students don't do the homework, don't study, don't know the most basic material from the prerequisite course, and yet we are expected to have high passing rates. Instructors and high school teachers pass these students undeservingly and they keep falling further behind with each course. Then by the time they get to my calculus class, they can't add fractions, factor, or compute sin(0).

[@farhant.3214]

can't comprehend sin(0) in calculus class is blasphemy 😭

[@wernerviehhauser94]

​@@farhant.3214nope, since we don't do trig functions anymore in minor courses here. I still predict that before 2040, either India or China will tell us how to do things because what's in the workforce or academics by then will in large parts be unable to wipe their backs without help - either because they are too old or too incompetent....

[@Issacnewton_]

maybe they should make it a little bit harder to pass the exams so that students have a fear of failing and that would make them study

[@wernerviehhauser94]

@@Issacnewton_ no use. IF you want to teach them how to work for a goal, starting in college is 15 years too late. If they don't learn it in high school, most never will.

[@Erik_The_Viking]

I've had similar experiences where the prerequisites didn't prepare them for my class, and I end up having to teach that material again. Ugh... Some clearly don't study or do homework but expect A's for some reason.

[@ovadof5029]

When you give your students the same exam twice and they fail just as bad as the first time, to me that’s an indication that they are just not studying well enough. A dedicated student would repeat the first test to get used to their teacher’s style of exams, and that goes for every subject not just maths.

[@rhosymedra6628]

When in my third year of teaching, I had about the same thing happen - average on a test was MUCH lower than my previous years' classes, in spite of me doing the exact same things that had helped my previous years students be successful, the dean told me "look. occasionally you will get a class where the average is far below the usual average. it doesn't happen often but it will happen and you can't beat yourself up about it".

[@realdragon]

Why is that? Is it the students, the teaching style changed, what happened?

[@Otterlier]

@@realdragonmaybe some events occurred that impacted all students in the course, if an event occurs it’s going to impact students in a way which doesn’t apply to other cohorts

[@JanB1605]

@@realdragon I feel sometimes it also comes down to class dynamics. If the classmates support each other, the class does better. But sometimes there's also a class where maybe for example a few of the more popular kids in that class don't like the teacher particularly well, and the whole class starts doing bad.

[@noahprussia7622]

Students are not engaged is what it sounds like. And it isn't like the old days, where you could take a class off and talk to them as a student body where people would actually speak up and voice their opinions. It isn't that students are not engaged with you; they aren't engaged in life. Try it, sitting them all down and asking "What do you need to succeed?" and see how little they care about their grades, their families, their careers, their own lives and their futures. So many of them just see bleakness and have given up, they coast like leaves on a river. It doesn't matter if the wind or the water takes them. They think any success in life will be external and random; arbitrary.

[@goldentortoisebeetle9741]

Best comment in my opinion

[@iantaakalla8180]

The sad problem is that when they are expected to get jobs, jobs are effectively randomly given. Accidents and disasters are pretty certain to happen. You can only really avoid by concerted effort in a well-off city or by being given a chance and protection. This is just in regard to jobs. Other stuff, too, are basically doled out at random. So while studying can at least be taught to be done purposefully, it’s just another tool that will rarely be applied.

[@jbkim515]

About a week ago, I came across your channel with the video of 'solving a general solution for a pendulum'. I immediately subscribed to your channel even before the first minute of the video. What I saw in that video was a vibrant, enthusiastic, passionate, and humorous dude with an awesome pedagogy. I had some professors that had similar problems like you. They were very passionate with what they were teaching at first, but years passed and they became indifferent to their students. WE DON'T WANT THAT THING TO HAPPEN TO YOU. We just want you to be happy. That's all we want.

[@PapaFlammy69]

[@Issacnewton_]

yep we want you to be happy

[@udveetpatil8002]

​@@PapaFlammy69Yes, please don't become like that. I truly do understand your postion. I suggest you try having a genuine talk with you class if that's possible, and lay your heart out respectfully, and also ask them if they think you can do something more. Also remember that you can't always help everyone, what you can do is your best, beyond that, don't let it stress you. I know that stress is comming from care but realise how much you have power over. Do your best, push them to do their best. Please don't let your flame die papa flammy 🔥. We love you.

[@MyOneFiftiethOfADollar]

You forgot to ask for the dude's phone number.

[@romanedenhofer1714]

I can tell from the last part that you really want the best for your students and I think you are authentically self-reflective. I have the feeling that you might have unrealistic expectations of your students. There is simply a different learning culture at school than at university. At university, students largely take care of understanding themselves, but at school knowledge usually needs to be served up on a silver plate - impossible not to get. As a private tutor, I have found that you can really only take one step at a time. As soon as you introduce two new phenomena at the same time in one task, it can overwhelm the student. You have to proceed very carefully and in a foolproof manner. Only when you explain a new thing and then immediately practice it many times will it be internalized. You should never want too much. Even formulating the same task slightly differently can be overwhelming. In the long term, you will progress faster than expected. You are even more efficient than if you explain several steps at once. Because that often takes its toll. At some point, you will realize that they haven't really understood something, and then you have to go back to the beginning and go over things again. Being a good teacher is a work of art. Good luck for the future!

[@MrTimAway]

It is very clear that you are passionate about it and that it's very frustrating to you when students aren't putting in the required effort. A piece of personal advice: Don't call your students "lazy f*cks" in a publically available youtube clip. I understand your passion, I also understand that you like them and I understand that they are lazy. You can get yourself into a lot of trouble, because 20 Karen moms will call the principal and complain that you referred to their little angels as "lazy f*cks".

[@douglasstrother6584]

"MY NAME IS GUNNERY SARGEANT HARTMANN, YOUR SENIOR DRILL INSTRUCTOR! IF YOU SURVIVE MY ISLAND ..."

[@o_s-24]

Doing the same test twice is a GREAT experiment. I will try to do it. I have given before questions on tests that are the EXACT same as in a homework, and just like your case, most people did them wrong

[@Viki13]

lol

[@highviewbarbell]

@@Viki13 for me anxiety is the one thing holding me back. I can be totally active in class and understand the problems, do all the homework and understand it, work through practice problems and understand them, teach other students to help them understand them, and on test day i shake constantly, am near collapse, can't think of basic solutions and end up scoring 50s, 60s, 70s, etc. Then when I get the test back I just facepalm with how I should have got 100.

[@Viki13]

@@highviewbarbell I have had slight issues with pressure during exams but on my last maths exam that I recently took I got everything right just because I told myself to calm down a bit since I was very well prepared and had great marks on the previous exams anyway so that's my tip just calm down and understand that an exam isn't that scary

[@-_addy_-]

I think the problem with thinking outside of the box is that in order to be able to do it you need a foundation of not only knowledge but internalised knowledge, which imo comes after learning something and applying it for some time. The shame is that most students are feeling like they’re being dragged between subjects, and when you add the fact that math needs application and practice to that you end up with students who are not able to answer “basic” questions. Most other subjects you can passively learn in some way - perhaps by just watching a lecture on KZbin or reading up on the definition. However math needs application and regularity in how you work with it. If you don’t dedicate time to it you’re going to have a much harder time down the line, and that’s where many people fall off. It’s also not about doing *any* application, you have to practice the right problems, the ones that are not too easy but not too hard so that you build an understanding and get used to seeing a theorem applied in different ways for instance. Knowing what to work on combined with having the self control and dedication to work on it is what is needed, and you can’t influence this directly as a teacher. I think some classes are flukes and will do worse, but this is not necessarily your fault. The only thing you can do is teach them what is required along with telling them what it takes and be there for them if they don’t understand something or is struggling with the course. But they have to put in the work.

[@Viki13]

If the students have chosen maths as a main subject (Mathe LK) that means they should expect to do some more stuff outside of school to get good or very good grades. I myself have chosen maths as a main subject and a lot of teachers told us maths would be very difficult and I read lots of scary stuff about it so I was ready to invest quite a bit of time into maths and so did a lot of my classmates and our course does well because of that

[@Ksizzle11c]

This has been mostly my issue with a lot of math; sometimes it doesn't really click until later when it's being applied in a separate subject. Sometimes I'm just brute forcing through concepts that are baffling in the moment.

[@danieljohnsonthejetpackman1456]

*Flammy:* 85% of my students failed the test *Comments:* You suck as a teacher, utter disgrace... *Flammy:* My students failed the same test just as bad a week later *Comments:* Your students are the reason, why we need instructions on shampoo bottles.

[@sepro5135]

I think the Gesamtschule is a significant issue. I am not a teacher but I do a lot of math tutoring for students and I know exactly what you mean. For most of my students who are in 11th+ grade, we have to go through adding fractions and other super basic stuff, like manipulating equations again and again. With students on a Gesamtschule, I think it is more severe, but I think it’s definitely noticeable even in Gymnasien. Nowadays parents choose (in Baden Württemberg) if their kid goes to a Gymnasium or to a Realschule. The reality is, some people are just not built for the Gymnasium, but parents still try to force it. And a lot just check out after the 7th grade and at that point it becomes a Sisyphus-like task to try and get the ready for Abitur.

[@romainblondel8320]

There is a similar problem in Switzerland, even if professional schools/trainees is fairly promoted.

[@benhur2806]

Can relate from the other side, was utterly convinced i should go to Gymnasium in 6th grade (parente, grandparents, teachers & co.), I made it, but with the things you mentioned plus a 3 hour commute every day, yeah by the start of year 9 it was just a sisyphean slog I didn't care about... The irony is, I know someone in class who did just as well and the other class nerd, but his parents explicitly wanted him to the regular Sekundarschule instead. Back then, I thought they weee being ridiculous! Now? After having to repeat year 9, then failing out and effectively having my education F-ed over with little chance of ever recovering, he's doing just fine! Turns out his parents made the right call...

[@suuujuuus]

I was almost always in trouble classes. It was a social death sentence to do good in school, you would be bullied, really maliciously bullied and teachers didnt have enough backbone for that, which I guess is understandable. I want to bring this up, to suggest that its not simply that "they are lazy". Actually, I would never use that word, since it is usually used to demean and not to observe and describe. It has no contentual value when it comes to figuring out what is acutally going on. In my time teaching at Uni I have never met a lazy student. Frustated ones, decouraged ones or overwhelmed ones? Yes. Lazy? I dont know what this even means in a non-emotional context. But I can understand the frustration and helplessness, like what else are you supposed to tell them to make things change? I experienced it as a class mindset/morale thing. In my 13th year on the FOS I got into a class that actually had a learning mindset (since it was a mix from the 12 year classes) and trouble makers in the previous years would make a 180 after some weeks. Then on the individual level, there are kids that have really horrible homes. The "lower" the school (Gymansium -> Real -> Hauptschule) the more of these kids you will have in your class. They are biologically on a lower level of a need hierachy, where emotional security and safe parental role models are more on their focus than exploration and learning. The trouble classes I was in until grade 11 were filled with them, and teachers were overwhelmed. I remember one case of a German teacher who would stop coming to class at the half-year mark. The teachers that would do the best with those classes were teachers, that would make jokes often on the behalf of one student, bite back, are able to communicate on their level, make them feel seen. It needs a good pedagogical understanding to deal with them, but most teachers I met were, from my superficial observation, just good at their subject while they lacked the much more important "ability to teach". This ability starts for me by understanding how humans learn - most of the teachers I had "intelligence" idologies, were the good kids were obviously high IQ, higher worth, and worth talking to, while the bad kids were low IQ, lower worth, and time on them was wasted anyway; Not the way you might want to do things. And ends with knowledge of communciation theories like Non-Violent-Communication (NVC) offer. The way I see it right now is that the school system generally is fucked. It seems disconnected fromt he actual job world and having the potential to harm a kids want to learn at least as much as to further it. We seem to absolutely neglect the fact that it is not normal for a human child, especially boys and troubled children, to sit still and attentive for several hours, our whole educational ideals disjointed from basic biology. Instead we prop up the good students, giving them lables like "gifted" and rewarding them, while punishing the bad ones. Reverse Robin Hood-ing like a boss😎. And much more bs. If you are interested how else we could go about, you can have a look at the Finnland or Estonia. There is also a ton of literature on the topic. Of course, nothings gonna happen from the Germans state's side in the foreseeable future.

[@wernerviehhauser94]

In out textbooks, there are self-study section where the solutions are given at the end of the book. I sometimes copy questions from the textbook for my tests. I told my students. About a dozen times. What do I get to hear? "Unfair! We never did questions like that!" Well, hope only dies last, but right there she's already six foot deep.....

[@mcnica89]

The story you told near the end of giving the same questions on a test multiple times, but the students not improving from the first to the second writing really shows that there is something weird/unique going on with the students and there are factors clearly outside of your control. It is a really hard situation! My only advice is to make sure you take care of yourself too: its easy to get really discouraged by the results even when its not your fault and you are doing your best (and in fact are a very effective teacher!!!). Sending love from Canada

[@dackid2831]

We actually had a similar situation in my Complex Analysis course. Not everyone did very well on the last midterm. Most failed and only a couple got a C. He realized the test was too hard, since this was not an issue on the test before. He was very generous and let us redo the problems, but we had to do them more thoroughly, during spring break for up to a +20 point boost. Since it was a proof course, he was far more interested in us understanding how to do it,which is why he gave us this opportunity. This is not a normal thing, so I'm very thankful he did that. Maybe something similar could be a good option for your students.

[@nikolasgkikas6173]

I have been a math tutor for about 3 years. I face the same hurdles you point out in your video. Unfortunately, the level of the students is declining at an exponential rate. I really enjoy teaching math and do my absolute best to not leave my students in the dark. You cannot make them learn how to think, it is something that they themselves should do. As much as I would love to give some advice, there isn't anything you can do better. Such negative exam results should not be a ringing bell only to the teacher, but to the students as well. I wish you and your students all the best and I hope that both sides understand that it requires a lot of effort to succeed, especially in math. (Love your content btw)

[@pirueta444]

Man, it would be great if you offered a math curse onlne

[@user-lt9nb9dx7t]

Math curse? 💀 What I am more for math blessing

[@o_s-24]

Here's a math curse: fuctor you, you son of a vector, you derivative of a constant

[@greyATK]

I too think a Flammy math curse would be awesome.

[@jobda1211]

tho i don't know if it's still available during pandemic he did a math course(?) on youtube (but in german)

[@tusharsr2709]

why would you want a curse lmao

[@trevornoble337]

Newer math teacher from Canada here and have been watching your channel for a while. What you described is very similar to what I do with my classes. I think as you pointed out, it boils down to the structure that you have to work with and also that the students are not taking accountability of their own learning. I set the bar with my students on the first day that I want them to fail in-class because if they are not doing that, they are not giving their best effort in learning. Furthermore, I can help them during the in-class exercises if I know where they are struggling, which I would prefer to see as opposed to seeing the first place they struggle is on the actual quiz or test. This can later be a talking piece when I see students who are not trying and are claiming that they are “doing their best”. Keep your head up, Jens, you are doing great as a teacher. These reflective videos are further evidence that you care for your students and want them to succeed :)

[@andreivulpe6148]

It's my third year of me teaching math in my country and I feel you so relatable! I "grew up" in math alongside your channel and it's interesting for me that I share similar fate with my favorite youtuber.

[@user-oe6dl6iu5i]

Sir, you are great. Also, keep the videos going and thank you so much for all the valuable help you have been for all of us!

[@Alonefern]

I don’t know if you’re still reading the comments, but I just wanna share an experience with a class that I took. The teacher the class before every test would go through the entirety of it. Not similar problems, the exact same problems and give step by step the solutions. Not only that but we were allowed to take notes on him doing it and bring those notes into class (he didn’t even check them so you couldve just written the answers and nothing else). So there is literally no reason for students to not only get an A, but everyone should get a 100. But when we got our tests back I heard students either glad that they got a C, or frustrated that they had to retake the test because they failed (which again would be the exact test which they would now have a physical copy of). This was a few years ago in a high school electronics class and there were (almost predictably) fires that were started. This was just an elective, an entirely optional class, but even though students had to go out of their way to pick it they still didn’t care enough to be safe or even just pay attention for the hour and a half to write down test answers. Personally I loved that class and the teacher and I was glad I could make cool circuits, and it’s the reason im majoring in electrical engineering. So even though most students nowadays don’t give the bare minimum, know that you are making the difference in the lives of those who are trying

[@johnny3475]

When I first taught, I was assigned geometry. I remember slowly lowering my expectations and standards over the weeks. I gave a group quiz on logic, but they all somehow did poorly. I even put the same question on their exam and told them 🤦‍♂️. I also told them I’m too lazy to write original problems and that I’ll be pulling them from the review section in their book. This was a whole year of geometry condensed into a 7-week summer course. Our community colleges in California don’t offer remedial courses anymore, so if they’re weak then that’s pretty much it. They’re doomed in courses they’re not prepared for. It was my first time teaching and I wasn’t trained to teach high school students (technically they enrolled in a community college). Next time will definitely be different.

[@DarinBrownSJDCMath]

Yup, AB 1705 is going to be a cluster****.

[@CopyDopey]

Back in high school my math class was taught by one of the toughest teachers in the school. This teacher used to prepare students for the national maths olympiad. Nobody in my class has aced more than one test per semester. I was in the top 3 and my marks gravitated around 80-90%, while about 80% of my classmates scored around 40-60%. Our scores did not fit a Gaussian distribution haha, it was a pretty skewed curve. Everytime this teacher introduced a topic, I kept wondering to myself if the teacher was going to finally tell us how the topic will fit into the overall ”picture” of math i.e. how it will connect to previously taught topics and how it will connect to future topics, how the certain math formalism was discovered and what should be the intuition encapsulated by the said formalisms. Unfortunately, my I was left dissappointed every time. The first class consisted of just writing down axioms, definitions and formulas. The following classes consisted of solving convoluted questions and proving uninspiring results. I will admit that the teacher was really neat and he actually proved things in more than one way, so like he didnt just leave us with proof by LEM for example. However, the results still appeared arbitrary and contrived and 80% of the class consisted of employing tricks and tactics. I always wondered to myself why the teacher doesnt just give us the algebraic tricks he wants us to employ. A lot of the time it didnt even feel like we were applying actual new concepts. His tests were draconic from a time pressure point of view and nobody really had the time to sit and think about the final problem on the test. You basically had to have really fast handwriting speed and to basically memorize the solutions presented in class in order to have time to think about the novel final problem. When studying, my first instinct was always that of asking the following : why is this useful ? what is the intuition behind this ? how is this supposed to be used in order to construct other mathematical concepts ? how did the author of this discover this ? Of course, I knew that the teacher could not provide answers for this, so I was kind of numb towards math because I felt like I had to censor my inner monologue as it made me ask useless questions for the class. I didnt really like meaningless symbol pushing and I wasnt particularly good at it neither. I remember back in the 12th grade when the teacher introduced Groups and especially Isomorphisms. I was like ”holy shit, this is ANALOGY in math !”. It felt like we were finally doing something constructive in a sense. Of course, the teacher didnt even feel the need to tell us a few things about analogy in math, at least to point out stuff like ”hey, remember the geometry you did in 6th grade with the whole triangle similarity thing ?”. Anyway, when I was studying for the tests (usually 3-4 before the test) I would try to reproduce the proofs on my own, as if I were to come up with them on my own. I would try to sketch a high level idea of the proof and I would only take glimpses at the proof when I was stuck. This approach of mine rendered me inefficient during tests because I couldnt just write the proofs directly from memory, I had to reconstruct them. Sometimes it even happened for me to finally understand a proof during the test itself ! My point is, my high school math experience was like this : heavy emphasis on memorization + emphasis on esoteric problems which seemed rather contrived with their sole purpose being that of discouraging the students + lack of meaningful examples and connections. I always felt like studying wasnt worth it because I knew I was not to come up with those contrived symbol pushing exercises given my lack of talent for that stuff + my interest in actual conceptual learning. I took a look at the exam that you gave your students and I must say that I WISH that my high school exams were like that ! Your exam problems encouraged the students to view math as a collection of concepts which can be chained together in order to construct something, they werent trick questions for the sake of trick questions. Based on the videos that you post on this channel, I think that your way of teaching is engaging and encouraging. I wish that I had a teacher like you back in high school. Yes, 80% of the students failing is not a good sign, but we have to keep in mind that we are talking about teenagers who might just not be interested in this stuff, some might even view it cringe. In the end, you are just one specific person who cant hope to ignite interest in math in all your students, thats just not possible. As long as you provide your students with lots of meaningful examples or you at least provide them with ways they can procure such examples for themselves, I think that 80% of your job is done. You can guide a horse to water but you cant make it drink it. I sense that you are doing a good job of guiding the proverbial horse to water.

[@gittinggud1507]

Just curious in what country did you go to high school? Have never heard of Groups or Isomorphisms being introduced in highschool.

[@CopyDopey]

@@gittinggud1507 Romania. Our curriculum is a tad weird because we are introduced to vectors in the 9th grade (the first year of high school, it is mostly a geometric interpretation of vectors, we are not introduced to functions as vectors for instance) while we are introduced to matrices only in the 11th grade. In the 11th grade we are also introduced to calculus and a bit of analysis using the epsilon-delta formalism. In the 12th grade we are introduced to groups, rings, a bit of field stuff and polynomial rings if I remember correctly.

[@d077Z]

@@gittinggud1507Groups use to be in the syllabus in Australia. I now go through a crash course in rings and groups as part of setting up the field properties of Q (and R) in junior(7-9) highschool extension classes. Unironically how do you even teach (HS) algebra without invoking the field properties? I guess you can not mention the world field?

[@prithvidhyani2002]

@@CopyDopey abstract algebra in high school is crazy!

[@goldentortoisebeetle9741]

I think they told your teacher “teach them algebra” and he was like “ok then” lmao

[@douglasstrother6584]

You come in here with a skull full of mush, and if you survive, you'll leave thinking like a lawyer." ~ "Professor Kingsfield" John Houseman's character in "The Paper Chase". (from way back when)

[@beatoriche7301]

I gotta say, I really like your videos on math education specifically, as I enjoy your reflections on teaching quite a bit. And in a way, I understand the perspective of the commenters you highlighted in that you don't wanna start by blaming the students, who are, in a way, currently being churned through an educational regimen that they don't have the kind of deeper knowledge to reflect on (and while they're often going through personally difficult times in life to boot). Student failures do reflect on stuff like their personal work ethic, they do reflect on the teacher themselves, but most of all, they reflect on broader institutional conditions in my view. If the teacher is forced to go through the curriculum at lightning speed and isn't even able to allot more time to, say, introducing logarithms for students who've never heard of the concept, to use your example, then the bulk of the blame lies with educational authorities in my view, and it maddens me that they are so rarely actually scrutinized. I guess in a way, it's easier for a student to start blaming their teacher or even themselves than it is for them to blame some people in suits that they'll probably never even meet. The problem starts with how we introduce math to children in my book - as a bunch of algorithms and computations to carry out (it still baffles me that elementary schools insist on teaching these weird algorithms for the arithmetic operations, for example - aside from maybe division, which I also only understood at a much later point, I have never used these algorithms after finishing elementary school. And for good reason: these algorithms are only marginally more efficient than just, say, multiplying by brute force once you have an understanding of decimal representations and distributivity (and I mean, hot take: humans aren't computers, so I don't feel like computational efficiency should be a priority; the longer method where students actually understand every step of what they're doing will always be superior in my book. It's also why I consistently favor completing the square over the quadratic formula, for instance; the time spent hammering in a formula with problem after problem could just be spent slowly going through a couple of questions so students actually understand what they're doing.), no child at that level actually _understands_ what they're doing (nor are they expected to), and it wastes a lot of valuable time.). And as grading pressure in this area ramps up and kids are made (through the educational system and often also friends and family) to view math as this test of their academic ability, they will understandably get math anxiety, which, on yet another side note, I certainly think is a legitimate concept, albeit not really one individual educators can address very well. So, here's my hot take: Just get rid of all standardized tests (which only add pressure to cover topics in a potentially haphazard way and practice question types over developing actual understanding) and curricula, leaving it up to individual math teachers and their students to decide what to learn and how. Hell, abolish grading while you're at it - granted, there will probably always be students who just aren't interested in math and don't want to learn the material, but I don't think they benefit from having to work their asses off to demonstrate their aptitude in something they hate learning about either, and if anything, that's only gonna make them hate the subject even more. I think it's critical to realize that mathematical experiences are highly individualized in their very nature and that students need to learn stuff individually and at their own pace.

[@sunnyjim2655]

You're not alone brother flammy. I'm from London, UK and I've taught A Level Maths Physics and Chemistry for 6 years. A Levels are the exams we take to satisfy university entry requirements. Most courses require at least one of these STEM subjects. My first two years (2018-2020), I had no issues getting them to understand the syllabus. Many of them would study independently and ace tests. Since the Pandemic and increase in distractions like TikTok, teaching from Sept 2020 onwards has been a mission, they can't focus or engage in class discussions. I pride myself in getting them to discuss ideas as much as possible so I can understand how they process information. But these new crops of kids just suck, I have got better as a teacher and tried adapting as much as possible, even making Tiktoks working through problems but my students attainment has tanked since before the pandemic. They have a nasty sense of entitlement, expecting teachers to do all the leg work. They can't focus for more than a couple of minutes and can't seem to apply their knowledge, which is what A-levels assess in at least 70% of questions.

[@danielmesserschmidt1591]

In my opinion, it's all a question of pressure. I myself took my Abitur in Baden Würtenberg in 2018 after going through all the other school institutions and now have a degree in chemistry. basically, i have experienced over all these different types of schools that the teachers who had the most respect/distance to the students also had the most pressure and thus also achieved the best results in terms of average, of course you should also remain human and not attach a job advertisement for mc donalds to a 1-point exam (all already experienced). i have also noticed that in some federal states it is not necessary to take a final exam in math for your abitur. you can simply replace math with another subject, or you can also pass your abitur with just one point in the final math exam. which in the end takes away the importance of mathematics for the students, especially if they do not choose a course of study that requires mathematical understanding in any way. if there are no consequences for not passing the exam, many uninterested students will not make any effort to pass the exam either

[@robinfalk]

Either way, I like the fact that you look at your results and want to make them better in some way by understanding the system I had a teacher that simply lowered the marks required for passing a class because most of them failed, which is not a good way to handle it in my opinion

[@Guylovesleep6802]

22:45 i am at this and i want to say have you considerate the students not knowing what they have to learn? Students already as you can see struggle with regular curriculum and while logarithm is needed and they need to learn it on their own but do they know they need learn it and not just treat it as something that can solved using calculator or other ways. Students feel they do not have the time. While it is true students are extremely lazy right now and it plays a role but it is also true they never have time. They act lazy because it feels like there is a lot of things to do while balancing other stuff(family, social life etc which is not possible to balance everything) so they avoid doing it. "Students have a lot of things in there plate and they try to avoid adding more" is my main point here. (English isnt my first language, so sorry for all of the grammar and not so good wording. But keep up what you are doing)

[@2wheels2]

as a student, i had a tough time understanding why i need to do the homework, i would cheat or just wing it. when teachers gave us a lot of work, it became too much and i simply wont even attempt 1 question. what could be happening is that you give them too much homework and they freeze due to the size of the task that is asked of them. try giving 1 homework page a week that would cover the majority of the subjects covered within the week. for example, if you have the derivative as the subject of the week, your homework sheet will have stuff they wont know till friday and stuff they will learn on monday. this way the kids will feel like what they learn can be applied and they need to learn it. mark these homework sheets with 8 questions. have a surplus of questions set aside for those that ask for it. sometimes less is more. and give the kids a reason to learn and keep what they learn. don't make the homework tedious, make it engaging and interesting: no easy task is remembered, it is only done; hard tasks will be remembered and ingrained once solved. hope this helps and good luck

[@YassFuentes]

I do empathize with you. PhD on physics here. Two years ago I started as applied business maths teacher for 1st degree on BBA, also in a private university. It was so hard for me to transfer my knowledge due to the lack of very basic principles, and probably to my inexperience. But, trust me, I was so compromised with teaching. All my fellow teachers, experienced ones, are telling that students are coming with quite low fundamentals and commitment. They say that it's due to the pandemic. I have no clue. Anyways, this current academic year I rejected to teach. Maybe next year I'll try again. Great video, btw. Stay strong.

[@Santi._.403]

I appreciate your work, you’re part of my inspiration while I worked through my master’s. Take care of yourself, sometimes we are defeated. Take some time to recover and build your confidence back. Also if pedagogy is your passion, consider androgogy. This is to say, give a context to the maths we use. I start my classes with a brief history of mathematics and the problems that were attended throughout different stages of humanity and at the end ask them “what problems exist today?”, and they like that. The idea is to get them to be curious about the world outside of their school. Best of luck.

[@krabkrabkrab]

I get it too. I teach a graduate course, and most content I teach is at the second year physics level. The reason is that it is accelerator physics, and so has an inter-disciplinary aspect; they are meant to apply physics concepts learned as undergraduates to unfamiliar problems... real world problems that impact design of particle accelerator and transport systems. In spite of providing them with homework that they cannot fail (I keep returning their attempts to them until they get it perfect), and a sheet containing all the important formulas they could need, in spite of all that, many of them could not do a "newish" problem on the exam. They could do problems that were identical to a homework problem, but not new ones that used the same concepts. If we fail such people, we get hell from the university. So we just find a way to pass them. This continued farce is bad for the field. Honestly, we actually pass people that I would never ever take on as grad students. In summary, I conclude that many students get degrees without actually knowing the material. They've just memorized standard problems and can reproduce them. They don't think physics; they just memorize.

[@Fru1tyy]

i definitely know some peeps studying pre-uni with me that have trouble doing indices or algebra in general which is crazy, jokes aside I am still student and I aspire to teach maths as well, watching your videos in the past was always a joy especially on topics regarding analysis and complex analysis. You're one of my inspirations for my passion in mathematics :D I'll always appreciate the work you've done on youtube and I believe other people do as well. So even though I can't speak in terms of teacher to teacher I just wanna say, Keep your head up king !

[@hennesjackobs9439]

As somebody who is pointed out in the section of mean comments, I did not write it with that intention. My attempt is an approach of section "Fehlerkultur" - mainly doing mistakes, analyze them and progress as a part of learning culture. What I find helpful is to speak openly with your students about the test results and ask them how they felt during the test. They will give you implicit hints what the major difficulty was for them. If the time control and concentration was fine for them, then the amount of problems in the exam (my major point) was not the driving factor. Sometimes they just confess that they did not prepare the way they should. You did not fail. It is a manner of offer and demands. For some psychological strangeness more offer can lead to less demand. If do more for the students, they become less active. The equilibrium of accountability drifts towards the teacher in the view of the students. In this cases, less can be more. The effectivesness to motivate students for abstract thinking and self-learning has ends. Students do not feel the responsibility that they have for themselves. It is a driving problem that students strive for different goals in a Gesamtschule and the school, teachers, students adjust towards the closest goal. These students are inherently less prepared for the Oberstufe. They are not used to problem solving or thinking out of the box since this would confuse students who strive for the Realschulabschluss. You can meet the heterogeneity with problems that are more open for different solutions and prepared help ("abgestufte Lernhilfen"). It does not solve the problem of dismissed topics.

[@greyemrednus]

As a former student, I feel sorry for my teachers - often times I just couldn't get the importance of taught concepts. Not even my best teachers could convey that as far as they could see. The positive impact good teachers (the ones that didn't turn numb in an often numbing environment) had on me was often realized only many years later. So please keep faith and being a great teacher I am convinced you are. Also keep venting. Cheers

[@jackinzbox.]

Who knows if you’ll read this (especially with how long it ended up :/) but I’ll say it anyways. You should try what’s called a flipped classroom or some modified version of it that works for you. A flipped classroom is where students watch lectures at home as homework and then do homework problems inside class. It may sound absolutely crazy and your school may not allow it but I think it works amazingly with math. I don’t know the amount of German resources out in the world but as you know at least for English there are videos on basically every foundational math topic online that you can assign students to watch as homework. You can even create some of your own videos to fill in gaps or expand further on a topic. With the assigned videos you can give an outline for notes maybe with some simple fill in the blank definitions so the notes aren’t hard and they know exactly what the key points they need to know are. Then in the classroom you give them homework style questions. Do some as a class if needed and then have them work on them together in small groups. I’ve found with math collaboration and talking problems out with other people really solidifies concepts as it gives you multiple perspectives on the same problem and hopefully one of them clicks and makes sense. Plus, unlike when they are at home doing problems, they can easily ask you clarifying questions or questions they would have never thought to ask you during a lecture. I know you said your class is lazy, so they may not even watch the videos. However, if you’re forcing them to do practice problems in class they’ll quickly have to face the reality that they have no idea what they’re doing and if they don’t watch the videos they have no chance in hell of passing the class. To ensure they are actually doing the problems in class you could tell them that the test will be made from a selection of the in-class problems. It’ll also further emphasize to the students that don’t watch the videos and therefore don’t understand what’s happening in class that they won’t just magically get lucky with an easier test. It’s also great for you as a teacher if you watch and help students do practice problems since you can start to see exactly which areas students are confused or weak in. Students tend to suck at knowing how to ask the right questions or communicating what they’re confused about, so if you’re able to identify where they’re struggling for them you can be so much more useful. If you were to try this it would definitely be a shit ton of work up front for you to gather/create a whole curriculums worth of videos and notes but assuming you teach the same class year to year you can easily reuse everything. Assuming you actually read this, thank you and I hope this helps in some way. You said you’re a newer teacher in the video, so just know that if students are allowed to make mistakes you are allowed to make some as well. Don’t forget you never stop being a student who needs to makes mistakes in order to learn. I love your videos and you seem to truly have a passion for teaching. Keep experimenting and learning and eventually you’ll find success. It’s only once you’ve given up that you lose all the passion and become a bad teacher. I don’t think the 85% failure means you’re a bad teacher or even that you’re doing anything wrong. However, the only variable you’re in control of is yourself so tweak the shit out of it in hopes of minimizing failure percentage. Wait… I think I just accidentally described an optimization problem. You can do those in your sleep you’ve got this!

[@sking3014]

You are amazing. You are helping people around the world!

[@manankumath]

This is heartbreaking to watch man, to know you're still trying new ways and doing your best even after seeing no improvement in the students is simply remarkable. I hope your efforts can bring change.

[@syq1729]

When I did my Matheabitur, we had a really old-school teacher from east berlin (best teacher I ever had), and he always came to class with hard problems from obscure soviet text books. his exams were also quite hard, and I remember the first exam we took also had a terrible average. on the other hand he was very kind with oral grades (tbh it was all frontalunterricht or we were calculating in silence, so he just used oral grades to make sure no one would fail the semester) in the end we all destroyed the zentralabitur. so from my experience i can agree with what you said- better to give bad grades during the school year than to give them false sense of security for the abitur. from my experience tutoring, people cannot do basic arithmetic operations (aus der summe kürzen usw, die üblichen verdächtigen) i guess because of lack of practice. I don't know how to get them to do the exercises. my approach was always to try and make them like maths, but that only worked like 20% of the time... and i am not good at giving "standpauken". I do think there needs to be some "emotional" basis, but I guess that can vary. sometimes I feel like all it takes is for them to solve one problem on their own to see that they can do it, and then they're hooked. what my old math teacher did was I think really good: once or twice per semester he gave out an exercise sheet (for example just with a bunch (like 50) of degree 2,3, and4 equations, also from some russian book). if you put in the effort you could really boost your oral grade, and also was of course excellent practice. anyway those were my two cents, probably a load of rubbish. good luck with everything! ich glaub an dich haha, du hältst da die stellung im klassenzimmer!

[@Butschrick]

It's good to see the teachers perspective. It could help to let the students do short tests for about 10 minutes after 2 weeks of lessons. So they see very early where they are at. Also, when they do homework, collect a handful and give them points for it. At the end of the semester when it comes to grades give them a plus (für das mündliche). If a student wants to improve the mark, let him do a presentation on a topic, might inspire them to get more involved in maths. Good luck it's a tough to be a teacher nowadays.

[@t.b.4923]

Maybe I can give my mustard to this from a students perspective. I did my Abitur in 2023 in NRW (don't know if you are also from NRW, because the curricula vary significantly, to my knowledge). Currently, Im studying physics and am not in the group of people to struggle with basics, but I can maybe comment from observation of friends and classmates who struggled greatly. We had a great teacher, but he didn't give a fuck if the students did the homework or not. I always did mine because the task where pretty easy. The students who got 2-4 Points in every exam were the same people that never did their homework. One friend of mine was also in this group, but he busted his ass of in preparation for the abitur and got a 3 (9 points if I remember the conversion correctly). So my advice is, be hartnäckig (can't think of a english equivalent) with your pupils and ensure that their do their homework. Control each one of them individually, and try to make them care about your response (they should feel guilty if they didn't do their homework). This sound fairly harsh, but it is needed for lazy folks. (I myself am lazy as fuck, my higher maths exam is in two days and I barely studied till now💀)

[@PapaFlammy69]

thx for the comment, best of luck on your exam! =D

[@t.b.4923]

thank you ;)

[@camicus-3249]

I'd usually get detention for missed homework. Realistically, if there was no proper obligation to study at home I would have done much worse lol If someone fails to run a marathon after exactly 0 days of training, no one is surprised. But when someone fails a test after doing no practice, they are simply "not a maths person".

[@namemanguy]

This worked very well when I was in HS. In Senior years it was expected that when exam results arrived it would be accompanied by a passionate speech from our teachers on how only 10% of kids got decent scores despite us spending a month doing similar practice exams. Eventually, they would clamp down and give out detentions if you didn't do HW or meet assignment checkpoints, and if they didn't more than half the class would fail out of the class.

[@t.b.4923]

the exam was pretty easy :) (i will probably still get a 4.0 or fail 😂)

[@FoolishGuru42]

It's an interesting conundrum. I can relate to the story as I've had a lot of classes go the same way. And yours is a very different situation to mine if you are teaching them multiple years. On one hand, it's entirely possible they are just lazy. I don't want to discount that. But I imagine there's a variety of issues. I would point 2 things out though. One is that you have a difficult job in overcoming a pervasive mentality that 'math is hard. I'm not a math person'. The second is that while any given test might feel like a measurable data point to you, it's a strand in a much larger tapestry that is their lived math experience. It's pretty easy to reach a point of hopelessness for them and feel like like no matter what you do, there's no point. So even though this feels like a clear "Here's one test repeated. It'd be so easy to improve". The volume of math can be very overwhelming when you consider potential gaping holes and years of life telling them they are bad at math. I don't want to say give up on them, because that's not quite right. But managing your expectations at this point is important. And it sounds like there's a lot of work that could be done towards going back to something they can be successful on and maybe modeling what successful studying/progress looks like.

[@Archaval_AZ]

Not sure if this will get seen but I can give a retelling of a similar set of circumstances (majority of the class failing) from the point of view of a student in highschool. This will be pretty long but I hope you can find some utility in it. During my time in highschool, there was a notable shift in the math syllabus going from the first to the second of the 3 total years. Generally everyone faired rather well in the first year, the courses were organised and the teacher was getting through to the majority of the students. He would give a weekly test that would feature some problems on the same level as the final exam that we would be taking in our third year. This managed to work relatively well enough to motivate the students to consistently practice the material and learn the concepts. Then in the second year, due to some blunders and misunderstandings, our teacher started the year immediately after the summer break with basic linear algebra. Almost none of the students, could keep up with the pace of the education given that we were basically starting the year from the middle of our maths textbook and most of us hadn't done much math during the summer to be in good shape for learning brand new material. As a result, the class was failing the weekly tests in overwhelming numbers, which was discouraging for us students and our teacher, who would both get angry with himself and with us for failing. The result was an expected plummet in terms of the overall perforance level. This was further exacerbated by the fact that the scheduling had changed and we wound up with one 2 hour class and two other one hour classes during the week, but really given the fact that the two hour class was at the end of the day, most students were already too tired from their other courses to be able to dedicate an intense two hour session to learning the material. Eventually this scheduling issue was fixed which helped a little, however the pace the teacher was going over the new material was still too quick for most people. However, our teacher made another notable blunder around this point in that he pivoted to complex numbers, which relatively speaking was better received than the basic linear algebra material, still did not do much to address the core issue of the students lagging behind on fundamentals. This was wearing on the students morale as well and resulted in many of us foregoing our other courses in favour of mathematics in hope of trying to avoid failing yet another weekly test (which was turning into a tradition at this point). I remember my feelings well for the final exam of the term. I had given up any hopes of studying for my physics exam in favour of just trying to put in as much time as possible into passing this one weekly exam. Hours upon hours were spent trying to go over the different problems and trying to learn how to solve them. The physics test came and went, and as expected, I couldn't answer almost any of it given that I wasn't studying for it. Nonetheless, I kept trying to focus in on the mathematics, "just one exam this year that's all I need, that way I'll show to myself that I am capable of contending with the subject". The day came and we had our exam. It was a booklet. Far too many questions to be solved within the allocated time span, yet another quality of our weekly tests which had also become a bit of a trend at this point. Only now it felt completely impossible. The sentiment of shame, disappointment and hopelessness was thick in the air, our teacher didn't look particularly interested in the test he was giving either. It had all become a bit of a routine, only now, it was starting to cause problems in all our other courses too. All of us felt hopeless in our own way I suppose. It was after this particular exam that good students, genuinely motivated and eager students, dropped down to a lower level math course. Those of us who remained did so out of a mix of ego, stubborness and the reality that this course was ultimately necessary for their future. Everyone who could drop the course did so and were in some ways perhaps better off for it. None of us were told that we failed that exam notably, I don't think our teacher ever marked it. I don't think he cared at that point; ultimately, he was the one who had failed to capitalise effectively on the students' desire to obtain an understanding and exam results that reflect said understanding, and he realised that. At the start of the next semester our teacher made some changes. We started from the fundamentals of the syllabus, going forward, chapter by chapter, building up a stronger foundation. We were still expected to study independently a fair amount but he also retired the weekly tests for now. They'd just turned into a weekly humiliation ritual and weren't helping the students who were already trying their best to grapple with the material. I'm not entirely sure what motivated him to do this. It could well have been the case that he simply didn't believe that we were studying and that our failure was because we were lazy and thus mostly our fault. However, once other teachers began complaining to him that the students were not studying their other courses, the reality of the situation became clear to him and he realised that the fault did not solely lie with us, hence prompting the change. After these changes were set in place, we quickly began progressing through the syllabus and managed to have a noticeable improvement. Eventually other matters concerning another math teacher leaving on short notice and the school hiring someone who was terribly underprepared to replace them caused a complete shitshow which resulted ultimately in us students in the advanced math class having no teacher for our final year. The majority of that year (>80%) we had no choice but to effectively self study mathematics in preparation for our finals but this was not as impossible as it would have been a year ago at the time. Those 6 months that our teacher worked on strengthening our fundamentals helped us get a better grip on mathematics as a whole and boosted our confidence enough to feel like we had a fighting chance, even if the odds were against us. The finals came and went. This time, nobody failed any of their math exams. The main take away from all this for me was that it's alright to feel lost, not only as the student but also as the teacher. You can't give up or become indifferent, sometimes you need to figure out another way of tackling an issue. Mathematics is not inherently hard once a strong enough foundation has been established, but in order to establish it you need time and patience, and it's the teacher's responsibility to provide an environment where they can help the students best strengthen that foundation. Not sure if anybody made it to the end but if you did, thanks for reading! I hope my own experiences could be of some use to others in similar situations, both students and teachers. As a personal note, I wound up going on to study mathematics in uni (after initially starting in theoretical physics) having recently now finished my thesis with high grades as well. All the failures back then were part of the process that got me to where I am now (:

[@yugalkhanal6967]

I just learned what an infimum is and I see you wearing it haha

[@PapaFlammy69]

:D

[@Savahax]

Jens, Du bist definitiv kein Versager. Dein Kanal hat vielen geholfen und inspiriert. Eine Idee für den Kanal könnte sein, über erstaunliche Ereignisse in der Mathematik zu sprechen, wie zum Beispiel Newton, der das Brachistochronenproblem anonym gelöst hat (Gänsehaut!!!). Außerdem könntest du coole Videos über mathematische Anekdoten aus dem echten Leben machen, ähnlich wie es Matt Parker in seinem Buch getan hat. Das würde viel besser funktionieren als das Lösen sinnlos komplexer Integrale, die sowieso niemand versteht. Wir (du) versuchen nicht nur, Professoren zu begeistern, von denen sie wahrscheinlich bereits sind, sondern auch mit dem durchschnittlichen Interessenten zu sprechen, der jedoch keinen Abschluss in Analysis 3 hat. Das würde dir sehr helfen. Nochmals, Grüße aus Alsdorf

[@tenns]

I feel i always did bad on tests during high school, i was always confused, it was nebulous, and I didn't "get it". I wasn't confident in what I could do or what could be done to solve a problem. I now study physics and it's much clearer when I've actually understood something. The problem is the lack of time we get as students in math class, where we can actually talk with a teacher and work through the confusion. This is the main reason I feel students fail. They often are quite close to understanding and being able to work on more difficult questions, but they are not quite there. I could see it in the few students that did "get it", and would do well. They saw the big picture and could focus on the technical steps that allowed them to solve most problems. The reason most of them did get it, was not the teacher, it was their parents. Almost without exception, all those kids that did well had parents that worked in engineering, physics and math jobs, that went to super difficult universities, passed incredible exams. Their parents tutored them, and the kids could always ask their parents for technical and big picture stuff. On the other hand, i had done the homework, prepared for the exam, and was still unsure of myself. Add on top of that that I am quite slow, and get easily stressed, and I would always get less than average grades. Teachers always labeled me as lazy and that I didn't try hard enough to work but that I was 'brilliant' and could do better if worked more. This is not at all what was happening. Yes, I struggled to get myself to do homework, by lack of motivation (adhd) but I always did do the homework and assignements, but they never helped solve the confusion, and I could never get on top of it, and see the big picture, as well as solve the technical minutia. I was like a mouse trapped in a maze never knowing where to go, or how to even get somewhere. It's the same problem i faced in writing essays in literature or history class, I could never figure out what I should say, or how to formulate it, in a coherent manner. Yet because i forced myself to do the minimum, and do the homework, i could get good enough grades in my private school, because most of the other student hadn't spent enough time getting to know some of the technical steps. Without exceptions, the kids that did well, were either geniuses, or normal kids, whose parents could teach the class better than the teacher, and would have killed them if the kids hadn't done the homework. The problem is the teacher doesnt have office hours, or has the time to expand on questions and confusion that prevent students from getting it. You can almost always teach anyone anything, some people are efficient learning engines and get it faster, some struggle and cost more of the teacher's time to understand, and get rid of any confusion. In most cases, the kids that do well just have another teacher (parent, siblings, classmates, tutor, themselves) that supplements the teachers job. The problem is the system, and we can see it, because it's normal thing for people to say they are bad at math, or that they are not a math person, etc... I was lucky because I liked math, so i could force myself to do the homework, and even I had math anxiety because i was always so confused, but in the end i thought the shapes and symbols were neat. But for the people that don't particularly like it, either because they haven't had an enthusiastic teacher or a bad previous experience, are constantly failed by the system. Kids need more time out of school and with adults that can answer their question when doing the work. And work that confusion. Math (and physics, and other stuff) is about working that confusion, getting rid of it, and seeing the things as a whole. There is not enough time in a day, both on the teacher side and the kids side, to get kids to do well in every subject and especially math, while relying exclusively on school time. Plus kids need to learn when to switch off and stop working. I haven't watched the previous video, or this one entirely, sorry if i missed something. But if you always did well in school, I hope this gives you an idea of what might be happening for some students.

[@PapaFlammy69]

I always did extremely bad ^^

[@goldentortoisebeetle9741]

I felt just like you in my school years.

[@Illusioner_]

From the perspective of a high school student, you are an absolutely amazing teacher. With the help of yt channels like you and 3b1b, I think that I am finally starting to understand calculus. The way you teach math is honestly very fun, you make everything seem easy. Have you asked professors who taught the same course before you about how they did it? Maybe looking at the tests they gave out, and seeing how well their class was doing might help. Also, maybe you shouldn't hand out the solution too early, that might cause them to just refer to it completely. You should probably give them a week or so to try and come up with their solution before sharing yours. I really think this is a problem with exams in general. I think they should be reasonably hard, not too hard, but if they don't make you think, whats the point. Any math exam that doesn't require you to come up with your own solution is bad. And people should really not worry about getting bad grades [ they are going to worry tho ] . The whole point of math in school is to learn problem solving, and if people would rather get good grades on an easy test than learn how to reason through solving problems on their own, thats just really sad .

[@starter497]

Watched the video. My suggestion is to construct problem solving questions during class and let them develop critical analysis skills. I found in my years of teaching its better to teach few topics with high depth problem for them to figure out in class without your assistance (they wont do it diligently at home). Yes the german exam may require all types of question but if you can highlight the important topics, some topics students can "reason" through the question without needing to be taught explicitly using their problem solving skills. Homework is resources for practice after they gained the foundation but many students are lazy early on so you need to instill good habits to them. This is also where you can add all types of questions that arent covered in class. Also letting the studentd know the expectation of the class early on goes a long way. Make them have graded homework assignments on definition. Let them know that the students are going to struggle on assignments and if they are not they are doing it wrong. Remind them everyday about homework by doing a warmup on homework to see who actually did it. Ofc incentivize those who did and keep requiring students who did NOT do homework to solve questions on warmup in front of the class.

[@lordyt3689]

yeah i mean for high school classes/secondary education you really should be able to pass all exams and tests. I‘m talking about PASSING (the higher of a grade you want the more work you have to put in basically). As long as the min. requirement is 50-60% of 100 pts then that is manageable. The more you adavance in eduaction the more you realize that you literally dont need any skill/high iQ to continue, its literally judt about how much lifetime you‘re willing to sacrifice for what grade. Also, hs teachers are still very reasonable whereas my professors in college (while all very competent and nice people, generally) teach their course and then throw like 30 ppts with 60-80 slides each at you and then go do an exam about that which is unreasonably obscure and just consist of random memory stuff you either saw & learned or didnt. I think papa flammy‘s class can be glad they have him as their teacher. Honestly, communication here is key and i hope you do a sit down with them. Give them their papers back and interview them. What went wrong, where did you struggle, why did you, did you lear enough for the test? That way they can communicate, hey, X topic was only breifly discussed in class and many of us had trouble understanding it, need further explanation, or too much material, we didnt know what the basics to learn are/scope of the exam was poorly communicated. Or they could just say no test was fine, just paralell with 2 other subjects that week and couldn concentrate on what to learn for what test.

[@Guylovesleep6802]

As much as i would like to say more lectures or trying teach them more harder. It is not going to work. They need motivation or something to make them work but i have no idea what to say

[@Rin04_GD]

I'd like to add that I have been watching your videos for the greater part of the last 3 years, and I have found your mathematics to be highly enjoyable! Though I am not a student of yours I have found myself learning through watching you solve different problems on this channel :) You have also given me a particular interest in integration styled problems that I enjoy very much! So thank you papaflammy

[@galzajc1257]

it's deffinitely hard to teach that class. for a long time i thought that there's people who find math easyer and people who find it harder. and i thought they just need more carefull explaination and more concrete examples with numbers. i explained things to my schoolmates in primary school and that was always pretty much the case it took a bit more explaination but they got it. then one day i was asked to teach 2 students from a different highschool, who were failing math. we were 17 or 18 and i was trying every way to explain them f***ing similar triangles for almost 2 hours, seriously like 10 different explainations and they still didn't get it. i just gave up at that point. i don't know what to recommend, i wasn't able to teach those 2 students anything. it changed my mind, i now think that some people basically just can't do math except multiplying a few numbers, that they learn by hard. and in that class there's probably many people like this. but yeah the same test story means they're probably also lazy

[@pseudolullus]

21:50 I train graduate students and, well, they get really angry when asked to learn or review stuff by themselves even though the ability to do so is an explicit part of their training. And yes, they are required to know calculus when enrolled in a science program, biologists use differential equations and linear algebra for modeling like everyone else. They'll have to review or relearn math by themselves.

[@TheoPhysicist]

I can well understand your thoughts on the biggest hurdle. My sister is at the Gesamtschule and is now doing her Abitur (now year 12). She chose math as her "Leistungskurs" and yes, it was really different from math before. Because as you described, it's much more abstract and you have to think and understand the concepts. I'm a physics student and I also work as a tutor. So when she didn't understand a certain topic, I would break it down and explain the basic objectives and concepts of new things. But that thought process is something you really have to do. You have to sit down and really think about it. And working with your brain is extremely draining and exhausting. And if you have to do it all by yourself, most students give up early, if they try at all. Because you can very quickly lose track and get lost in it. And I believe that if you don't recognize the beauty of mathematics or don't even know that it exists. Then the magnificent space of mathematics is simply black and you're just groping in the dark. And sometimes the darkness is so black that you can give them the exact same test and also put a massive light on - the students have a black hole in the left pocket that swallows up any light... because to get rid of the black hole it needs actual work and energy

[@matthiasschoene]

It's obvious that as a teacher, you can't influence your students' grades to 100%. And as you rightly said, you provide sufficient material, so it is important to increase the activity of the students. I have had good experience with using homework very similarly to the test, so that you get a direct benefit from doing this homework. Another option would be to have the homework presented by a randomly picked student for marking, or to check it in a short test at the beginning of the lesson. This will be associated with a lot of cat and mouse at the beginning, but will gradually increase the rate of completed homework.

[@louiswhaley258]

From years of experience at Kindergarten to 12th grade (vicariously through my daughter) and undergraduate education (as a college professor), if the administration backs you up, it doesn't matter how many students you flunk, but if the administration gives into tearful students and irate parents, you will receive the blame and be forced to change or to leave. I knew one Ph. D. with decades of experience in both, teaching and industry, who was saddled with a class of about 30 students. Half of them flunked. This happened despite the Ph. D. setting up study sessions etc. that were optional for both, the teacher and the students, and despite the general knowledge among faculty that nearly every student in his section had had trouble with the course in the past. He was put on probation etc. and the grades were taken out of his control. He was not a hard teacher. He was very friendly and loved his students. He had great ways of explaining problems. But the administration had to satisfy the parents and students who "weren't getting their money's worth." Eventually he was given fewer and fewer sections and he finally stopped teaching. Sad. So it's not you. It's the luck of the draw. Keep improving. Best wishes.

[@AIexPlayGames]

I'm a student and last year in computer science we had like the exact same scenario as you descibed here. I love computers and I study a lot, so for me the class went very well, but besides me and two other students almost everyone failed the tests. During breaks they were shit talking the teacher, but like, there was nothing wrong with how he taught, they just did not study at all. Eventually everyone got a passing grade but the reason was because they started cheating and our teacher became more and more lenient with their grades over the course of the schoolyear.

[@dalitas]

I remember helping my fellow 2nd year masters students (5th year uni) with logarithms and numeric solutions to sets of equations. This was because they didnt want to remember or learn maths, they just wanted to scrape by and finish and get a job. Its sad to see it on so many levels.

[@justkarl2922]

I can fully understand you. My parents ask me frequently if I couldn't become a maths teacher. And you are describing this situation which I am really fr*kin afraid of. You explained it so well and I can't resist to say that under those circumstances I never wanna become a teacher in school. You have just to aknowledge that the majority fails at matth and thats all. And I sadly don't know about a solution for this problem. Hell I don't even know if a solution does exist? But still I just wish you the best and I hope it gets better someday

[@PapaFlammy69]

[@michaelmedeiroscharbonneau7955]

Hi. I have been teaching math for 3.5 years and tutored for about 7 years before that in what's the equivalent of end of high school/start of university (the province of Quebec in Canada has an intermediate level between high school and university called cegep and that where I teach). I admire your ability to question your approaches. Teaching is a complex task and rethinking how we do things is the way forward. As a focus, I will talk more about my impressions about the end of the video. I would have been very (badly) surprised too if I had prepared a lot of material for the students to study and got test results like we see in this situation. I relate because I also like to make some practice material myself when I can. Like that, students already know my style of writing before exams. My first idea would be to try and meet one on one with some students to figure out what makes it so the studying went so terribly (so I assume right now as the most likely cause from the two videos you made). When they do come to talk to you about why it went so bad, I would just listen and not judge them as that's the best way to get an honest answer out of students by experience (you're a cool person, so not worried about that :P). It's also a good opportunity for them to ask questions about the test they might not have asked in class. I'm aware of the little time we teachers have for initiatives like that, but it pays off to this very day when it comes to how students see the courses I teach. As for basics that are reused year after year, I have found it a great investment of my class time to give them even just a tiny exercise on past material that's going to be used during a given lecture. For example, if today we're going to learn how to find critical values for a polynomial function using the derivative, they'll need to factor at some point, so I make them start with very brief solving of polynomial equations using factoring. It's very true they did see the material before, but I came to accept that most people need a refresher even on extremely basic things. I find students follow a lot better my examples and start practice faster when the basics are already pulled out from the depths of their brains. It takes a big cognitive load off of their ability to focus on new topics when old ones are reviewed before. I think I'd also freak out if no students in my class would start to try an exercise I gave during class time. One thing I realized I was good at when I saw students struggling with starting practice is giving them a list of steps to the problem to be solved (I usually write it on my whiteboard). I want them to have understanding beyond learning recipes blindly, but we gotta start somewhere. It's insane how much people work better when you give them a list. Also, if people are stuck or I expect them to be stuck, I give them pages from the textbook with a similar example to mine so they can compare and get a start. It'll sometimes give them a reason to ask a question and from the answer, make progress on the necessary understanding for the problem. Thanks for making the video! I got to learn about another education system today. ^^

[@korakatk318]

From a students perspective, I was definitely lazier when I was at that age too. I think most people don’t realize they don’t need a teacher to crack open a textbook and learn for themselves (I didn’t when I was younger.) Those who will pursue math or something math adjacent will learn this either in your class or soon, or they won’t be able to succeed because I think most higher level classes expect you to self-learn a lot of content outside of the classroom. If anything the classroom just tells you what you need to learn and tests if you learned it, all the actual learning is done at home.

[@shiru6610]

Ich hab vor paar Jahren Abitur an nem Gymnasium gemacht und wir hatten damals 3 Mathe-GK Kurse. Von diesen Kursen hatten auch alle einen Durchschnitt von 4,X bei den Klassenarbeiten...

[@luizalex.7424]

Dammit, the last part actually made me sad.

[@NPCNo-xm2li]

I wish my maths teacher was like Flammy back when I was in highschool. It might've made me be more interested in maths instead of making me hate it until my last year of undergrad.

[@mr.inhuman7932]

The transition to the Sponser was really smooth.

[@PapaFlammy69]

thx :D

[@anonymousOrangutan]

ive attended both EPFL and the university of geneva and 85% failure for introductory courses is not uncommon. ive had two professors tell us outright that they aim for 80% failure on the first day of class. this may seem strange but the pedagogical context in switzerland is that students are almost expected to repeat their first year. exams do not get easier in subsequent years, but students are prepared. i also studied in canada and ive noticed that swiss students are far more prepared than canadians in upper years of bachelors. i guess what im saying is 85% failure has different meanings in different contexts. any student who loves maths who failed your exam will come out stronger, i have no doubt about this.

[@anonymousOrangutan]

i just realized that you gave the exam to 12th graders. not gonna lie, if this happened at my high school you would have been fired. (i went to high school in america)

[@gavinmoss1603]

i just graduated with a math degree and STEM education minor, I thought I wanted to teach but I realized that math teachers don't get to teach math. I will forever be a tutor reviewing how to add fractions no matter what age I choose to teach

[@poopslappa1661]

As they say, fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me! If your students were given the SAME test, after having the answers are explained, there's simply no denying that they either didn't care or were so far behind that they couldn't begin to understand even the explanation.

[@RandomPerson-yq1qk]

I am currently tutoring somone in math who will be taking the Abitur this year (non germans: basically graduating high school) and then wants to become a teacher and one of the subjects she wants to teach is math. The person can't properly work with fractions consistently. a * b/c sometimes becomes a*b/a*c. They had no idea how to add fractions. I am kinda confused how math is done at their school. Simplifying fractions wasn't really understood properly. I think it has gotten better though. Power laws weren't any better really. But honestly I don't even mind that too much. Apparently they never heard of commutativity or associativity. All calculations were basically done by pure intuition or memorisation instead of a solid framework of reasoning. Even when the rules like distributivity were written out they couldn't really use them well enough. As an example they couldn't derive the binomial formulas like (a+b)² using these three rules, they could only draw some arrows basically showing HOW to compute the formula. Implications and equivalences were unheard of concepts. I think this is far far worse. Students learn to solve problems and calculate with intuition without ever really backing it up with a solid understanding and reasoning of the underlying concepts. Intuition is important and students don't need high level math rigour, but we don't need people that can regurgitate the quadratic formula. Even in school at a certain grade students should be taught to do math by using formal logic and get a solid understanding about some of the concepts. Some form of proper logic should be required.

[@Oreo_od50]

My tests always have at least 50% the exact same questions from homework’s or examples in class. It never matters…

[@Rachel.comedy]

I am a student teacher at a high school, and for me your test was easy. I also tutored college-level math courses and what I noticed is a lot of students follow procedure and want the answer. It is rare a student is willing to take time out of their day to try to digest and understand the material

[@shay4210]

As a PHD maths/physics student who is a teaching assistant, I 100% can see both sides, and I understand your frustration, after watching this video I went back and solved all the questions on the exam from the last video, and I agree with you, it was a really simple exam on properties of derivatives and functions. The exam was completely fair, the functions & values were nice to work with, and anyone who was prepared would’ve passed. I learned something from one of my professors when I was going for my bachelor’s degree and it stuck with me, and I now use it with the students I assist with, and I think it could help so I’ll share it with you, maybe you can try it. You definitely care about all your students and want to see them do well, I can see that from the video. When I make a homework assignment or exam for a math class, I make it so 70% of the questions are pure theory, and the remaining 30% are ‘real-world problems’ / application of the topic & relation to the last section. So if it was a paper on derivatives, the theory portion would have questions like “State the first/second derivative of the given function” and “A function has a stationary point at (a, f(a)) if f ’(a) equals ___”. The remaining 30% would be the application and relation part. For derivatives I typically will give a basic physics question with a position function being a polynomial and ask for the velocity and acceleration equations, and have the student explain in their own words, what the derivative means for the question they just solved. Then, in another question I’d ask for a ‘mini proof’ in relation to limits (Here, they learn limits and continuity before they learn differentiation). So I’ll give them a function and have them explain why this function is differentiable, then later on in the question I’ll give them the derivative, and ask them to verify it using the limit definition of the derivative. On homework assignments I try to do some of the thinking for them as I understand the topic is not fully understood yet, but for the exam I let them show me what they know, and only provide enough information for them to work with, with a couple easy questions that I call ‘freebies’ just so they can at least get some points. It's also a weighted in favour of the theory, so a student won't fail for not being able to think critically, but also won't be rewarded with the most points possible as they didn't go beyond and think outside the box with what a derivative represents. I think that helps as a teacher since when you grade the student’s work, you can see exactly what you need to focus on making sure they understand, whether it be theory and method of solving the problem, the application and critical thinking skills, or both. Like if mostly everyone got a derivative using the chain rule wrong, you know you need to review that again, but if they get everything wrong, even get the freebies wrong, then that’s on them for not putting in enough effort. If they won’t put the effort into learning, that is not a reflection on you as a teacher, just remember that. Good luck with the rest of the school year! (sorry this comment is so long lol)

[@PapaFlammy69]

all godd, thxfor the comment

[@irgendeinlappen7703]

I didnt do my abitur, I was at a Gesamtschule and tried to do my abitur in 3 years (I thought the 11 grade is for refreshing and catching up, isnt it?). It didnt work out for me back then. Some years passed by and i decided to do my "Fachhochschulreife". At this point i thought i want to study psychology, therefor I did it with the focus health and society . Since almost everyone else in my class was pretty bad at math (so was I at this point, but i was way more motivated), the math teacher, who was actually a great teacher, had to so his best to get the basics somehow into the heads of my classmates. This led to terrible lessons (frontalunterricht etc, da die anderen nicht bereit waren selbstständig zu arbeiten). As I finished I lost most of my interests for psychology and releated classes and decided to study electronic engineering, wich was a pain at first, because my math basics weren't good enaught, but i kept learning and put in much afford and successfully finished math 1 and 2 and other mathematical classes like signal and systems. Well whats my point with this story? I think some people at this age, just like me back then, are not ready to take it seriously enaught and just dont put in enaught afford. And thats okay. Maybe the actually shouldnt do the abitur and do smth else first. Not every math teacher i had was perfect, but i would never blame then because in the end of the day, I just was to lazy back then :p Excuse my bad english, i didnt put that much afford in it as well :p im workin on it😂

[@irgendeinlappen7703]

Also it's a pain to write in english with German auto-remediation ^^

[@flameousfire2896]

I'm not sure I got this right but do you have one standardized test for all students but part of the students haven't been taught logarithms? In Finland you can choose "short math" but there are also two tests available.

[@carultch]

Triangles don't have circumferences. The word you're looking for is perimeter. Circumference is a circle-specific term.

[@PapaFlammy69]

thx for pointing it out!

[@iamtraditi4075]

This was an interesting look behind the curtain. Thank you :)

[@PapaFlammy69]

[@theeaglesshadow449]

First off, I am not a teacher. But I have been a difficult student to teach. I remember talking with my physics teacher in high school. I asked him why my grades were worse than my friends (We were all nerds, but I scored consistently lower). He gave me a straight answer. I needed to practice more (e.g. do my homework, because I didn’t). I did not change my attitude towards homework. So, until graduation my grades stayed lower than my friends, but when the graduation exam came around, we would spend a lot of time in class preparing (a.k.a. practicing all kinds of questions.) And my graduation exam grades where significantly higher than my usual grades, not only that, they were amongst the top of my country (I don’t remember the actual percentage though, it was more than 10 years ago). After graduating with almost all A’s instead of just B’s and C’s. My teacher came up to me and apologized. Why did he apologize - After all he had correctly identified why my grades were lower - ? He apologised because he had failed to recognise why I wasn’t able to do my homework and find a way for me to be able to do it. What does this have to do with your situation? The students might not necessarily be lazy, even if it may seem that way, but they may have been adversely affected by the pandemic and thus missed some crucial lessons like the importance of putting in the work and discipline. I don’t know if this is the case for Germany, but in my country, teachers are basically raising the students and teaching them manners instead of the students’ parents. Since students might have had to stay at home during the pandemic, they might have missed some of the important lessons of growing up. So, if that’s the case all I can say is to show them some tough love by teaching them about failure and consequences. In other words, force homework checks every week. It’s not fun or glamorous, but if they consistently refuse to put in the work, you both have proof for their parents and know where the problem lies when they fail their tests. Oh and sometimes providing them the answers to their homework beforehand can hamper learning as they might be able to copy the answers. (Not sure if that is or can even be the case here, but never underestimate the laziness of a student.) Another way to teach them the importance of homework is to spend some time during each lesson to focus on doing homework, but you might already do that… I don’t remember you saying anything about it in this video. And if the problem is more similar to the issue I was having, maybe you could provide them with the logistical means of doing their homework. e.g. a classroom and a supervised homework period or something along those lines. Another good idea might be to ask a colleague, preferably one that teaches a different subject for the same class if they face the same issues. And how they would approach the issue. I hope this might have given you some valuable insight and I wish you good luck with this challenge.

[@bantix9902]

As a student, I was very demotivated by too much homework, there were some courses, like math, that I really enjoyed where I did my homework almost everytime. There were other classes where I didn't enjoy it at all and I never did the homework and never looked at the stuff we did in school again. I think some classes are just not for everyone and some people don't want learn how to analyze a poem, some people don't wanna learn geometry, linear algebra or analysis. Why do we force students who don't want to learn complex math and don't see themselves using complex math in their later life to study math anyways? It's demotivating for them.

[@arcanetwix]

in the end everything is connected. linguists use math to analyze language. if you really try to understand the epistemic basis of math you land in philosophy and science of sciences.... of course you can leave out some things, but not on the abitur - abstract thinking is about making connections and realizing that the divisions the school and universities are making are fake. when you really, and i mean r e a l l y, try to understand things you will cross every boundary. if you dont want to understand then leave the path of institutionalized learning. tldr: it's about growing as a person and realizing all knowledge is interconnected

[@Rudenbehr]

It’s very hard to be forced to learn linear algebra. You don’t just casually take that class lol.

[@quwidicomequick1738]

i cant stop looking at this double pendulum but it seems to be so predictable. does it behave more chaotic when it has more or less momentum? it makes me crazy haha. i love your videos btw

[@romainblondel8320]

My classmates do the same : only doing all the homework the day juste before the test and asking the teacher at this time. I think this is a problem from our times (and I'm in maths option with this problem). For example in physics we were 5/20 with 5.5 or 6 out of 6 for grade and the rest was under the average so I think it's the laziness of my generation, sadly. I've another example: in maths, the technic test about derivatives has a class average of 3.8/6 wher my teacher was expecting 4.5/6 from his previous class (note: he is one of the most experienced of my school). So I wish you the best of luck with your students. Have a nice day to everyone who reads this comment.

[@levislevitas]

consider the entire dynamic, for kids who are raised on easy mode your class may be a big shock to their system vs the same material 20 years ago. it's much harder for kids now to do work if they are used to being lazy. as a parent this is my observation that the initial resistance to doing work is severe, but once they get past that hurdle more learning makes further learning easier. but as a teacher you don't have all the levers to control their activities in a way that would be able to force them to do the work.

[@davidmarshall8628]

When I was teaching lower division college math, I included a good proportion of worked examples from the textbook and assigned homework problems on the tests. Nevertheless, many students managed to get these wrong. (Now that I've had time to read more of the responses it's clear I'm not alone in similar circumstances.)

[@danielsharp2402]

We are in a pretty similar situation here in Hungary. The problem is that most students are right. School and later university really does not matter much. What people fail to realize is that learning to think for yourself definitely does. I'm under the impression that most teachers want it done that way but even the systems don't let good teachers teach and don't encourage even good students to truly learn. It's a failure of education in general.

[@user-zg8ny5tp4g]

I wish in the next videos you should involve students who study at high school and who just love math but with more simple explanation, because if you don't able to reach complex math problems to ordinary people that mean you didn't understand math well. Thank you for your efforts here

[@MichielvanderMeulen]

such a large failure precentage can help bringing life in the students, that they will take it more serious next time, you need to set a standard at a level you think is good

[@juridicalbike344]

One quick question: If you're a new student, how do you know which definitions are necessary and what intuition to develop thats outside of the "box"? I understand seeing that someone lacks pre-requisite skills and cant figure it out then works it out with the professor and fixes it on their own or at a tutoring center type deal. but beyond that, how can I effectively prioritize these things and know whether or not something is a dead end or not, & whether its within the scope of the class to know so?

[@PapaFlammy69]

From doing your homework and learning by doing.

[@Cosmos0000]

I'm currently a bit under the weather, so I apologize ahead of time for how much of a disjointed ramble this is probably going to sound like. I've just had quite a few thoughts while watching this video and am probably too foggy-headed to structure them well. 😅 I'm not German, but I had to take the Abitur before being able to apply to university in Germany (I study computer science). I know my own struggles as a student in Germany are somewhat unique given I also had to deal with learning in a foreign language, but many of the issues I had seemed to be ones my classmates also shared. The biggest one is one you mentioned - not having a good foundation of the basics. Things like Bruchenrechnung and just grundlagende Rechenregeln in general... were all lacking for most of us. To help with this, our teacher gave us a sheet with a bunch of basic rules so we could reference them while working on practice problems (I was very thankful for this since it had been quite a few years since I'd taken a math class before this). Another thing that helped was when our teacher would solve a problem with us on the board step-by-step... and I mean every small step, every small Rechnung. Many of us would get lost in the details of "how did you get from this line to the next" until we had seen it done once or twice - my main example here is solving Gauß-Matrices. If the teacher didn't write out the Nebenrechnungen, we were lost. I don't know how possible this is, but I think one thing that would have helped me out temendously, is if I had had a list of topics that I was supposed to know beforehand. Like you said, students have so many other classes they have to take and study for at the same time - having to also play catchup in math by learning whole topics on your own is really difficult and often not very feasible imo. But like I said, I don't know how possible that is. I don't know if they have much time between 10th and 11th grade. Not to mention it requires students taking initiative. lol. I think you're being too hard on yourself. It sounds like you did everything you could to help them out. The only thing I can suggest is talking to the class. Asking them where their hang-ups are. I know kids often have a hard time speaking up, but there might be a couple in the group who would be willing to speak for everyone - assuming they know where the problem is. I know I personally have a hard time pinpointing where it is I'm having trouble in a class. The problem might also just be them not having enough time and prioritizing other subjects that they think they have a better chance of passing. I know how stressful studying for the Abitur is. I found myself having to prioritize due to mental and emotional exhaustion, and I still ended up with very severe burnout afterwards. If it is laziness, which is certainly possible, you can't do anything about it and maybe in a few years they'll find themselves at a Weiterbildungskolleg with an actual eagerness to learn. Side note (because apparently I also needed to vent lol): Here's a gripe I personally have with learning math, albeit more at uni level than Gymnaisum - the complexity of the language used. I think it's important that new topics be explained in as plain and simple a way as possible. Once the topic is understood, then by all means, add the formal language that you also need to know. I don't know how many times I've been so uterly confused and frustrated by my lecture notes, only to turn to someone who understands the topic really well and have them explain it to me in such a simple way that it finally makes sense. Only afterwards do I find my lecture notes helpful. Another thing that drives me nuts is when we're given a topic and its definitions but no real written description of what that thing is. A basic example is when we were learning about Norms. It took entirely too long before it was even mentioned that it's a length. We went though two examples of how to find the Norm in R and C and we were getting these numbers as answers and all the while I'm sitting there like, ok cool... but what does this tell me? lol. The biggest problems I have had in my Linear Algebra lectures are not enough practical examples in class (using numbers and not just variables/general stand-ins) and not always being clearly told what topics are telling me about vectors/vector spaces - what new information I was getting. Essentially, the relationship between what we have learned and the new thing we are learning. I feel like making these connections is essential to having these things stick in your head. It's the difference between understanding something and just memorizing for the exam. Sorry for the long post.... 😅 Also, I love you shirt. lol.

[@bastianfrom77]

Hi, ich würde mir zuerst mal kollegiale Beratung besorgen. Entweder in der Schule oder im Schulberzirk von einer Nachbarschule. Ohne diese Beratung würde ich folgendermaßen vorgehen: 1. Ich mache den Schülern klar, dass die mit der Leistung die Klasse in dem Fach nicht bestehen werden. 2. Elternbrief über die Situation mit Gesprächsangebot - am besten Einzeltermine, Gruppentermin nur mit Support Klassenlehrer. Ich würde einen Eingangstest unangekündigt schreibe - sehr Basic über elementare Sachen die man als Voraussetzung zu dem Kurs mitbringen muss: Pythagoras, Bin. Formeln, Nullstelle finden, Gleichung umstellen - fließt nicht in Note ein, ist aber diagnostik. Wenn der Katastrophal ausfällt sind die Probleme vor dir entstanden. Wenn die Probleme vor dir entstanden sind, würde ich den Schülern nochmal klarmachen, dass sie sich jetzt den Hintern abarbeiten müssen um das Klassenziel zu erreichen. Dazu gibt es von deiner Seite 3 Möglichkeiten. 1) S. sollen Nachhilfe nehmen, ist nicht dein Problem. 2) Du bereitest SOL- Einheiten vor über den gesamten vorherigen,relevanten Stoff - da gibt es teilweise auch "freie Pakete" von Kollegen in Deutschland, wir hatten mai eines mit über 1000 Arbeitsblättern zum selbstorgan. Lernen für alle möglichen Mathethemen - Name ist mir leider entfallen. 3) Wie 2. nur mit zusätlichem Gesprächsangebot - quasi eine freiwillige Unterrichtseineheit 1x die Woche. Zusätzlich würde ich das alles gut dokumentieren, ab und zu bei einigen Kandidaten mal Hausaufgaben einsammeln, unangekündigte 5min-Test die die Hausaufgaben überprüfen, usw. Wenn dumm läuft fällt halt 80% durch.

[@ankursardar4707]

hey Flammy i hope so you dont feel bad from this nick name but i want you to know that you are one of the math youtuber whom i watch to always review my math knowledge. i am currently studying in college and am a physics student so we also have to study some side maths from the math teachers but the students of my class are so shit that they dont bother with the class they just sit there for attendence they dont brink notebooks to class like everyone is Ramanujan but none can solve simple problems when called on board. its not teacher's fault its the class's fault. please note that a class comprises both teacher and students. today's generation is shit i agree with this fact everyone wants just ease and nothing else no one understands the elegance of these knowledge. all i can say to you is either you can let them be shit and decrease the level to the absolute dumb level or can raise the level. just teach the theory and solve only ONE single question. rest is homework which if not done, student shall not be seated in the classroom and hence neither in exam hall. be strict who solves everything for their student. if they do wrong, give them hints. thats all i can say to you. and please note that i dont care who comes to you and says that we have other subjects to study besides maths well to be noted, only 1 hour maths studies is enough to learn a lot. so be strict with them. if you are angry on them let them know that they are dumb peice of shit. unless they feel bad for themselves, who's gonna help them?? i have been watching your videos and Andrew's videos so i know for a fact that you are not a bad teacher just hang in there it will be alright.

[@PapaFlammy69]

[@personalanonymous3172]

Not sure how your system works in Germany with Private schools, but: are Homework exercises graded? *Note that I'm only speaking from the perspective of a student, I don't really understand the struggles of teaching, only of learning. Throughout most of my school/college life, homework has been graded, at the very least for completeness if not correctness. And I think my biggest strength in school/college has been the fact that I almost never miss a homework. If you're giving your students a lot of homework exercises but never grade them/ask them if they did it, then it's basically not useful at all, at least for "lazy" students. And by the way, I think of myself as "lazy" too, at least, my younger self. If there was homework that isn't graded, I would just not do it. But despite the fact that I'm lazy in general, when my homework is graded I work hard to finish it, and then understand the concepts better and therefore do well on the tests. After growing up, maturing, and learning about how I learn best, I've developed the discipline to do homework even if it's not graded (not always, but enough until I understand the concepts). But I didn't have that discipline when I was younger. Back then, I did homework for the grades; then I realized that doing homework made me learn more/do better on tests, and now I do homework because I learn more. One more note of caution: if you give TOO much required homework, it might give the exact opposite effect. If it's too much, they might speed through it, either by cheating or by learning at a very surface-level and not really understanding concepts intuitively. Ideally, from the perspective of a student, homework should be a learning experience, not a chore; and the teacher should be a person to learn from, not a villain to beat by any means necessary.

[@walterht8083]

Have you uploaded material to a Google Classroom or something like that? Some of your students may simply be the kind of people that can only learn from textbooks and self-study. When I was in high school very often I didn't pay any attention in class, I would write down everything the teacher said and copied everything he/she would write on the blackboard, but I would do it like an automaton, my hand would do that while my mind would be in a completely different place. Later when exams became a close reality, I would prepare for them using textbooks and what I had copied from the classes, as a guide of what the teacher cared about. I did fine that way.

[@user-lt9nb9dx7t]

In all seriousness: There are two models of teaching, both have applications. When I was getting my Bachelor’s, in most classes teachers oriented at top 10% and made others to either catch up or drop out. Now when I teach I am forced by administration to adjust the difficulty of the problems so that not a single student is left behind. Personally, I am satisfied if at least one student is satisfied.

[@pyrotas]

Ok, I feel like adding a bit more on my comment about your other video. My "camp" is the one blaming it on the teacher. I am a teacher as well, I teach Physics 101 at the University in Italy which makes it easier on my side in so many ways: no intermediate tests, just a final written+oral examination and that's it [1]. And as a teacher, I have experienced the same situation as yours, at times. There are classes that seem to perform statistically better than others even though I tend to think that their 50-70 components are always essentially homogeneously and normally distributed, coming from different schools and different parts of our Region or even from outside [2]. Still, there seems to be - from time to time - an outlier class. As per my mentality, I always try to scrutinize *my* performances when a class is particularly underperforming. Because my side is the one I can control or analyze best. There are times when one is particularly stressed out, more tired than usual, maybe under conflicting deadlines. Sometimes one decides to make subtle (or less subtle) changes in order to better convey the messages or to improve the engaging of the class. All these effects add up. I can clearly remember two situations of a underperforming class, and in both cases I realized that one or more of the above factors had affected my teaching (even though the final assessment of the students about the course did not reflect this conclusion of mine). My idea (which is personal and has importance 1/N where N is as large as the number of teachers in the World) is that no matter what the milestones of a class are, one should strive to keep as much of the class as possible at pace. I know that this is utopistic most of the times, but still a part of our job is planning teaching and activities in such a way as to make sure that all key concepts are adamant to as many individuals as possible. Actions that may help to "recover" or at least ease the situation are multiple. For instance, encouraging "teaching by doing" - whereas one develops theoretical aspects while working on the student at the blackboard. Creating a positive [3] atmosphere so that nobody feels judged (at least, by the teacher) when she is called at the blackboard: i.e. blackboard does not necessarily mean a oral test (I don't know if you have such grading method, we have in high schools). By also trying to tame (i.e. eradicate from the get-go) the bullying attitude that usually the smartest students have towards those who proceed at a slower pace, this allows the teacher to consistently probe the progress of the class as a whole, or at least to keep a better look at it. You may be already doing this of course. And sure, doing so the teaching speed is slower so a careful and sensible planning is in order, to blend all in. And still, this is just one among many ideas (flipped classroom is another trick that comes into my mind). This being said, there may be another point to keep in mind: after 2020, the "waves" of students arriving in our classes are those who have suffered *massive* blows in their stomach by all the quarantine, lockdown and the stuff COVID-related. This is especially true for those who *started* their school in 2019-2020, but is true no matter what level. Teaching and especially improvised online teaching during those times has led to a (in my opinion much) less solid background of skills and knowledge. Even more, there have sure been *heavy* psychological effects (I can clearly see diminished self confidence and a reduced socialization level, even though it's 2024). This *has* to be gauged and taken into consideration. And this may need further investigation, as in trying to think "where were my students in 2020? What were they learning by that time? What could be less solid? How could it impact their career now?". Another pair of considerations, and a final question. If your class seems a bunch of lazy asses, they may be - but it's statistically not plausible. It may be possible that you didn't manage to build a good report with them - it happens sometimes and it doesn't take much at that, all it needs is a couple of "critical events" or that some of the most influentials in your class dislike you. Or maybe, you are keeping a level a bit too high - in that case what comes through as lazyness may simply be "I can't keep pace, he's running so why bother?". I think that whatever is the case, a nice chat with your students about the state of affairs, hearing from them why they think "this is not working" is the best time spent in this situation. About the "same test twice in a week, same results": this is not really a surprise. Sure they didn't understand the matter the first time, but it seems clear that your class is lacking independence in study, which goes through a honest self assessment and the ability to seek for advice in the teacher. Finally: it is worth asking yourself "do my students ask enough questions during/after lectures? Do they seek me for tutoring?". Because this is another excellent thermometer of a class: too few questions are seldom due to an excellent teacher, most likely are due to a cryptic one. And this is a lecture that I learned the hardest way when I began teaching a while ago. Keep the spirit up and work *with* your students: you'll get through this phase and you'll remember them as a special class :) Sorry for the very long comment! [1] In the Public Italian University the grading scheme - especially for fundamental exams - is almost always almost all weighted on the final exam. You can at most split the written exam in two parts, one of which to be delivered some halfway through the year/semester but that's it.) [2] Unless you teach in some kind of fancy Internationsl school such as IBO, it is likely that your students are quite local, and maybe many of them come from the same school. Some of them may have even had the same teachers before you, which enforces a degree of correlation (or confounding, in statistical terms). Also, I kind of guess your classes are composed of something along 20 individuals, maybe less. [3] Note that 79 is prime too :)

[@conando025]

God I can only imagine what you are going through. I always liked math and I comprehend it easily. Now I'm studying Computer Science at University and that rate at which my peers forgot the contents of the math lectures was astounding. Even the ones that did good on the exams seem to have purged that knowledge from their memory. And this is with University students not highschoolers. The one thing I wished my classes would have featured more (I went to School in Saxony) is deeper focus on why. The why to Math was always brought up as a justification of the topic but few students actually engaged with that. They cared for the How to solve problems because that was how they did tests. But for me the Why was more important. To be more concrete using the example of the point and the line question. I feel like most students try to memorize the questions and the thought approach to solve such a problem. (Our teacher put way to much emphasis on this where he even went a head and had us categorize the problem statements to know what method to use) But if you know what the equation of a line entails than the check for if a point line on the line is obvious. It gets to the are of problem solving at the heart of Mathematics

[@classic7033]

I'm sort of in the group of both sides. On one hand, my personal experience with lecturers is them teaching one thing and giving totally far fetched exam questions (which really disincentives students to study at all). On the other, many students just don't put in the necessary work when the teacher does give assignments that align with exam questions. I can't truly say what's the situation in your case since your exam seems fair but this could be because I study a stupid amount of math. If you could make a video on what practice questions you give students, then I could make a fair assessment.

[@addcoding8150]

First of; I think you are doing a good job, but you need to differentiate your statement: "Have I Failed as a Teacher" -> definitely not. You care about your students and are trying your best. "Have I Failed Teaching" -> Yes, because your students failed your tests, that you intended for them to pass. And failing to teach is normal and to be expected. Nobody is perfect and you have no control over your students' lives. TL;DR: watch the "Systems Thinking Speech by Dr. Russell Ackoff" (I swear it is about education/educating). ______________________________ The next thing is that you seem to think that you can teach your students something. This is impossible. Learning happens when you have a mental model and then validate it. You can't insert your fingers into their brains to build a model for them. And you can't fail for them. Both tasks have to be done by the student, not the teacher. So, what can you do? The only answer I've come up with in my years of giving extra tutoring (Nachhilfe) is to motivate the students: (The following advice is heavily biased and I know that it might be hard to implement in a classroom setting, but it is what worked for me) Try to give the student a real problem. Not a task, but a problem. This has to be something that interests the student. The first lesson I just spent listening to whatever the student tells me. It results in us doing no school work, but it's vital that I learn what moves the student in everyday life. Afterward, I can give the students problems until they think one of them is interesting. The most ridiculous example of that was a seventh grader (13y.o.) who made like 4 d*** jokes in the first 45m lesson and told me in the second that he started playing Fortnite. I then proposed to measure the sizes of the **** of the character(s) in Fortnite and after 3 sessions he could do calculations with percentages and such (Dreisatz) fluently since he needed to convert pixels to centimeters and back. That's obviously an extreme example, but I just wanted to illustrate that they often need something that interests them to become interested in the math required for it. Other examples were me looking into climate science with a student and evaluating local climate records (grade 11, graph analysis). Another student wanted to make games, so I just grabbed the basic unreal engine demo project and we made shaders for it in shadertoy (grade 10, functions). And for probabilities, I often was able to use video games, since they are like mini-casinos anyways, or friend group/community relationships. (grade 13, probability). One thing that seems to be most crucial is the severity of feedback and frequency of feedback. The motivation of students who spend an hour calculating something and then failing was gone afterward and took a long time to regenerate. Students who used interactive tools like Shadertoy or other graphic visualizations (Desmos, Wolfram, ...), had less of a problem, since the errors were reported instantly and the changes were always small. I know that I recommend it from the point of privilege that I teach/taught 5 people at once at max. I was able to just tell them to bring their laptops or tablets with them and keep an eye on the usage, which was... difficult in a classroom setting. But I can assure you they never wanted to spend time with me in the first 2 sessions, because it was a thing their parents wanted. This is also the reason why Brilliant is a bad place to send students IMO (I have not used them for 3 years, maybe things changed). They require the student to be interested in the topic before starting. If you have trouble with motivation, they will not solve it.

[@toastersman217]

I have been teaching for only 3 years (to students between 17-20 years old), but I also feel the struggle. Me and my collegues noticed is that our students are not flexible at all. In order to have good grades, we have to put exercises that are almost identical to the ones from the manuel. If we dare change the sentences and twist the problems a little bit, we lose at least half of the class. They have really bad reading skills. Personally, I also noticed that students don't take accountability for their success and often blame the teacher. I think it is really important to keep a good level of formality and not lower the level too much. Its part of my job to give the students the truth about their math level. I am not there to give candies and make everyone happy.

[@multisteve56]

Jens, I would really like to get in touch with you, but the email address you provided seems not to be working🤷🏻‍♂