How good at math? How about average?

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I get to answer with an option not on the list :p.

I majored in math in college. I plan to go to grad school in math. I plan on getting a PhD in math.

Compared to mathematics, I'm terrible at arithmetic and carry a slide rule with me everywhere.

Allow me to describe my math skills with a picture:

Thta's why I said I'm not interested about the maths taught in elementary school. I got difficulty with arithmetics too, and I had a very hard time to learn time tables. Didn't prevent me to get perfect score in algebra and some of the math subjects beyond, which is somehow closer to actual math skills, I guess. Why giving so much importance to arithmetic, calculators are better at it anyway.

I got straight A's in math all through high school and college. In my junior and senior years of college, I didn't even bother buying the class textbooks. I realized I didn't need them to get A's, so they were a waste of my money.

Math was my best subject in school but I need at least a piece of paper or I get lost. I have a pathetic short term memory so I can only do simple math in my head. I also struggled to learn my multiplication tables.

None of the poll options fit me. I used to be reasonably competent (at the "eating integrals for breakfast" level ) at maths but I've never liked it (or believed in it; it's a tool, that's all) and I'm no longer good at it.

I can't even do that .

Everybody has at least one thing they're not very good at. I know a person with a high IQ, but his spelling is atrocious. I'm no good at maths at all, but my spelling is really good and that's the only thing I've always been ahead of the rest of the class in all through school. I got 100 percent right in a spelling test we did in our last year of school (and I was SO proud of myself because that was the first time I had ever scored 100 percent in anything in my life!).

Um, when I say 'arithmetic' I tend to include anything up through calculus . Arithmetic is what my computer does for me, mathematics is what I do. If it can be done by a computer its boring and counts as arithmetic.

I eat integrals for breakfast, but arithmetic makes me sick; It seems the more advanced a math is the better I am at it, I never memorized my times tables, yet I can formulate complex proofs in my head. I'm better at geometry than algebra, and most of my problems in calculus are related to algebra.

And I'm completely with Tuttle here.

I was actually good in basic arithmetic when I was in elementary school.
When decimals,fractions,negative numbers,percentages and equations are added to basic arithmetic that's when I have a problem.
Algebraic equations are too frustrating for me and math has so many rules.
Geometry was visual so I did okay it that.

Like many aspies, I have very uneven abilities. I was extremely good in English class at school, but very poor at math despite extra tutoring/trying as hard as I could.

Here is a little secret: Math has only one rule, that there may be no contradictions. Every mathematical theory is based on that one rule and a few definitions and postulates. You need to break everything apart, and see how the other rules were created in order to truely understand it.

Last edited by Ganondox on 19 Dec 2011, 10:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Good explanation of math, Ganondox

Elementary school = Great at math. Top of the class.
Middle school = I don't want to talk about it.
High School = So far, so good. (I'm only a Freshman, though.)

I like that there is such a wide variety of answers reflected in the poll. It shows that the frequent myth that aspies/spectrumites are all good at math is not true. I would classify myself as about average. I had some difficulties in high school, but I think that was mostly because I slacked so much during this years. I did really well when I returned to school four years later and in university, so I am thinking I am average.

Same here. In elementary school I was always one of the slower kids on those math drill quizzes. I always made mistakes and got the wrong answer.

I didn't know I was good at math until I got into calculus, real/complex analysis, point-set topology, fractals, and chaos theory. At that point math became a special interest. I'm good with doing proofs that leave everyone else clueless. OTOH I can't do long computations and/or algebraic manipulations fast or without making small errors that screw everything up. It pissed me off royally getting my score knocked off on tests because I didn't get the right answer or ran out of time even though I knew how to do all the problems.

I don't know what it is. My working memory and computation skills have always been average to mediocre. Intuition and theory is where my strength comes in. 99% of people are the exact opposite of me. But who cares. Computers can do what I'm not as good at.

Yes. Long algebraic manipulations where you have to keep track of a million terms and keep all the +- signs straight to get the correct solution are basically no different from arithmetic, only more hellish. A lot of problems in differential equations lead to NASTY tedious algebra like that. The theory of differential equations is interesting but actually doing the problems is kind of meh... I never got great scores on my diff eq tests. Thank god for Mathematica (but too bad I can't afford my own copy ).