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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 7 to 31 of 495. Go back in thread:
Posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 15:36:52
In reply to Re: got test date, posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 8:48:41
http://www.mathsisfun.com/long_division.html
you have got to be f*ck*ng kidding me
Posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 15:46:51
In reply to Re: got test date, posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 15:36:52
oops. i think i jumped ahead. haven't got to remainders yet.
Posted by rjlockhart37 on January 16, 2014, at 15:53:02
In reply to Re: got test date, posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 15:36:52
thats crazy! super long dividing, who would want to make that more complicated?
Posted by rjlockhart37 on January 16, 2014, at 16:08:52
In reply to Re: got test date, posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 8:48:41
so your next test is thursday? simple math is my favorite too....i don't like intense calculus but still if i knew it that would be good....
i googled some of thwe stuff your talking about....
http://www.purplemath.com/modules/solvelin.htm
http://www.analyzemath.com/high_school_math/grade_12/problems.html
http://www.nbclearn.com/nfl/cuecard/51220
^^tell how they use pythangorean thereom in football plays...vary intresting!and here's just a quick tip on it, not really practice problems
http://www.regentsprep.org/Regents/math/algtrig/ATT9/pythagoreanid.htmim not in math right now, but i don't like textbooks when i am in math, i love using the web, google, or bing, and google the keywords and either put solve or learn or practice....
math is not the thing for me....but why don't you post what exactly yourr learning that way can work on it through google and learn it through posts here.....
r
Posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 18:18:18
In reply to Re: got test date, posted by rjlockhart37 on January 16, 2014, at 16:08:52
> why don't you post what exactly yourr learning that way can work on it through google and learn it through posts here.....
I started with the Kindy skills... And now I reckon... I'll be done with year four by the end of today... Or, tomorrow lunch time, at the latest.
I'm basically trusting them to introduce problems in an incremental way which means I need no formal instruction. We will see whether that is true or not.
I picked the NZ curriculum... But I think the only difference is the money. 'Yard stick' is still coming up as a unit of measurement, and it talks about how much Jerky people take to walk the Oregon trail...
Posted by rjlockhart37 on January 17, 2014, at 12:50:21
In reply to Re: got test date, posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 18:18:18
i checked the website out....i looked at grade 12 the one you said your doing, i would try to give your pointers, its been so long since i did that kinda of math, i did take in grade 12 in high school but i have forgotten alot of it....it would take me weeks to learn it to help you, i am willing to help your solve problems that you can post, why don't you post the problems your practicing here on the next post and ill see if i can help you with them....
r
Posted by alexandra_k on January 20, 2014, at 20:31:05
In reply to Re: got test date, posted by alexandra_k on January 16, 2014, at 15:36:52
around 3/4 of the way through... took a day longer to finish year 4 than I thought... things are going much slower now.
taking a lot more mental effort to do the calculations accurately. if i don't pay careful enough attention i make too many mistakes and can take... more than an hour to master some of them.
elapsed time got me for ages. you know... it is twenty minutes to three in the afternoon now and so and so does such and such for twenty two hours and thirty two minutes. what time is it now??? In digital format. With a colon. Or it is WRONG WRONG WRONG.
aaaargh!!!!!
i mean... i can do it. but that sh*t is HARD. wah!
i'm going through paper like nobodies business... but only using a calculator for figuring the mean in statistics (there can be, like, 28 three digit numbers).
i am learning my times tables! still make stupid little errors... but guess the thing to do is to check everything twice. and there is more than one way to do things... which means you can mix things up when you check... so that is good.
i am fairly amazed at what i can do now! i can do stuff with fractions! and decimals! and i can multiply with crazy numbers of zeros! and identify nonogons and convert into decilitres and i'm even starting to enjoy division! and i can remember 8x8 and 7x7 and most recently 8x7 - so that is pretty good for me, too... getting there, i am... even though i still think 2x8 is 18 half the time... because of the 8... for some reason...
i am feeling pretty drained with it. but, lets see...
Jan 9 - 2 hours 28 minutes.
Jan 10 - 4 hours 41 minutes.
Jan 11 - 5 hours 12 minutes.
Jan 12 - 7 hours.
Jan 13 - 5 hours 47 minutes.
Jan 14 - 7 hours 42 minutes.
Jan 15 - 7 hours 45 minutes.
Jan 16 - 7 hours 51 minutes.
Jan 17 - 2 hours 25 minutes.
Jan 18 - 8 hours 59 minutes.
Jan 19 - 9 hours 33 minutes.
Jan 20 - 7 hours 33 minutes.
Jan 21 - 3 hours 44 minutes. Thus far.Which makes 80 hours and 41 minutes of practice. 25,525 problems attempted.
so... i guess i'm allowed to be feeling a little drained with it. i really want to jump ahead to next year for the fun stuff... like geometry... but i won't let myself until i've finished all the grindy f*ck*ng multiplication and division calculations... and stuff does build and presuppose stuff that went before... and what is great about now is that everything i try... i KNOW i can do it. figure it out on the basis of what went before / their explanation of how i f*ck*d it up.
one day and a half before my test... they better let me do math for science. they f*ck*ng well better.
Posted by Partlycloudy on January 21, 2014, at 15:47:32
In reply to Re: year 5...., posted by alexandra_k on January 20, 2014, at 20:31:05
You have already surpassed me, and I passed college accounting. You go, girl!
Posted by alexandra_k on January 22, 2014, at 18:50:33
In reply to Re: year 5...., posted by Partlycloudy on January 21, 2014, at 15:47:32
it was okay. it could have been a whole heap worse. the first question was easy. listing how many thousands and tens and ones and you had to put them together for a whole number. then a fairly straightforward multiplication. some stuff i could do, i guess... only... i was a bit flustered and frantic and... something took me back to my school days, i guess... started counting on my fingers all funny again, so getting stuck in the middle... and not being cool and calm, really.
i think i might have got the simplest algebra question. there is something coming up now (that i'm a bit stuck on mastering because i get the odd question and i can't for the life of me see how to answer it...) involving 'guess and check'. so... stuff like... there are 88 hotel rooms and there are 3 more rooms on each floor than there are floors. how many rooms are there? anyway... i think i figured out how much x was worth. but i don't know.
a couple of co-ordinate questions. only percentage ones were really easy. like - a number out of 20. asked which fractions were equivalent to 30% and I think i was cool... because 30% is 30/100 - right? not 3/10 or whatever... there was a train schedule one, too... wellington trains even lmfao...
i think i f*ck*d up a luggage question... lets see... i think the dude had to pay $200 for his 70kg case. because he had to pay $5 for every kg over the limit. and so some chick has a case that is... 45kg. i think it was. or maybe 35. how much does she have to pay??
so... 200/5 = ah. i thnk i f*ck*d it up there. but that is how many units over he was, yeah? maybe i'll scrape some marks for my working scratchings. sigh.
then there were triangles... and i had no f*ck*ng idea. google... i think that the numbers in the corners would have multiplied themselves into the number in the middle. i didn't know that / didn't see that.
i was panicked a bit. and my brain stopped working. people were rustly. my knowledge of times tables etc is fragile... and the test seemed to like 4's and 6's which i'm not particularly good at. and i got embarrassed about counting on my fingers... and then i ended up doing that all wrong, anyway. sigh.
still... i'm hoping... that i did enough to show that i have some of the right ideas of how to go about doing things... and... well, i don't quite know.
i think... i think all of the questions could have been figured out by someone with... a good grip on their times tables. if i had more time... i think i could have done a better job of it. i... i don't know.
i'm pissed off that i didn't manage to solve the luggage question - because i could do that one. if only i wasn't flustered. there was a shape one, too. figure out the value of the shapes and the rows of shapes summed to various numbers... i think i f*ck*d that up and i think i could have done it (though i was assuming they were positive integers).
i don't know how negative numbers play, either. i don't know what happens when you times them or whatever. there was one expression about a slope of a graph... maybe i figured it out. looking at the relationship between x and y... maybe i figured it out. by ruling out the ones that weren't true... being left with the one i didn't quite understand :-/
english... multi guess was alright. do you think 'common people' could be an answer or is that a bit un-pc? there was something about watches... being too expensive for the 'common person' or the 'average person'? i'm not entirely sure... the tone seemed to be to be sort of a little bit colloquial... there was something else that depended on whether x or y country was in the carribean (final destination therefore 'Finally') or not (therefore next).
Then they wanted essays on why we wanted a place. and I... Went spew spew spew the way that I do. Ahaha. They said they cared about spelling etc etc. But I wasn't about to say I wanted to be a bone doctor just in case I spelt Orthopedic wrong though I said I wanted to improve my visual spatial skills because I wasn't sure what was up with visuo spatial. Ahhahaha. Ugh.
Apparently they call people over the next couple days for interviews. No interview: No place. Fingers crossed...
Posted by alexandra_k on January 22, 2014, at 18:59:54
In reply to Re: got tested..., posted by alexandra_k on January 22, 2014, at 18:50:33
oh. and there was a object sequence completion task at the end and it was not a f*ck*ng sequence. i f*ck*ng swear. there was no relationship between any of them at all.
but i've seen the likes of them on the medical admissions exam they make them do for graduate entry in australia... sigh... three shapes floating aimlessly about an octogon...
Posted by alexandra_k on January 23, 2014, at 16:40:05
In reply to Re: got tested..., posted by alexandra_k on January 22, 2014, at 18:59:54
I think the issue is that I'm just learning the vocabulary. And the meanings are... Abstract. So a little bit tricky to grasp.
I do have some math knowledge that is rote memorization learned, without any meaning attached. I can just fire off that 3x7 is 21, 3x8 is 24 and 3x9 is 27. Not sure how or when I managed to get those sunk in there... But I got it into my head that that was what it was all about. Having a bunch of math facts memorized in there that could be instantly recalled.
But that strategy is error prone. At least, it seems to me to be. And... It is fragile. In the sense that there are an infinite number of facts... So it will only get you so far...
I can do some kind of visualisation or... recombination or... something like that. Instead of wracking my brain for what 4x6 might be and seeing what occurs to me... Trying to ram it in there via repetition... The way I thought it was supposed to be learned... Thinking that one lot = 6... and I already know that 2 lots = 12. And so two lots of 12 is equal to... Ta da. Then, just to make sure, I know that the answer should be equal to 4x5 which I"m pretty sure I remember well... And another four. So yeah, fairly sure I got that right.
Maybe that is the idea. The more different ways you have of checking... The more likely your ways converge on truth. And it is better to see than to memorise... Then over time you see faster / what is seen becomes more automatic.
It is like the meanings fell out for the test. And all I had was a bunch of fragile rules to try and apply. Like moving the decimal place to the right how many zeroes there were instead of thinking about little cubes making rectangles making cubes making rectangles...
I like math. I don't know that I'll be at the level that I need to be in the time that I have. But, well, I suppose I have all the time there is, really. Yay for disability benefits. I guess.
I think I need to split my time between working skills I need to work (like my tables, obviously). And progressing my way through the grades. It is getting pretty painful now -- because my times tables aren't really good enough, I'm starting to see. I am really tempted to jump ahead with stuff... I would like to do more stats and some of the other stuff I find easy... But I guess it is more important to get some of this right... I don't feel very confident at reducing fractions, either. Because of finding the greatest... Uh... Number that can divide both. Divisor?? And I need to learn the rules for when things are divisible by 9 and so on... Because some of those numbers are getting pretty large...
Posted by alexandra_k on January 23, 2014, at 22:45:07
In reply to Re: slowing down, posted by alexandra_k on January 23, 2014, at 16:40:05
yay.
yay hurray.
at least i now know (or will hold onto it anyways) that: i interview well. oh yes i do. oh yes, indeed i do. the ONLY thing holding me back is math. and i'm going to fix that. oh yes i am.
fingers crossed.
:)
4x is easy. it is just 2x all over again. and 6x is just 2x 3. which is why a number is divisible by six only if it is divisible by three AND divisible by two. ahahaha. but adding up the digits and that number being divisible by three is just weird. WEIRD. WEIRD NUMBERS. three is a weird number. hurr.
Posted by Partlycloudy on January 24, 2014, at 5:50:35
In reply to Re: i got an interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 23, 2014, at 22:45:07
Congratulations on securing an interview! I am sure they will be happy to see you have been working on your maths skills.
PC
Posted by Poet on January 24, 2014, at 13:20:58
In reply to Re: i got an interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 23, 2014, at 22:45:07
Hooray for you. I was called stupid as a child by my teachers because I can't do math. These days I would have been properly diagnosed with a math learning disability. You will triumph over those numbers and ace that interview.
Poet
Posted by alexandra_k on January 25, 2014, at 19:13:22
In reply to Re: i got an interview » alexandra_k, posted by Poet on January 24, 2014, at 13:20:58
thanks, guys :)
looks like things are going well for us all so far this year...
my math progress has slowed considerably. or... perhaps that isn't quite fair... it is more that i'm progressing through the problem sets much more slowly now. because they are more demanding. involving more calculations. more concentration.
they are also starting to rely on stuff that i don't feel is being sufficiently explained. starting to think maybe i'm missing stuff...
- getting fractions down to simplest form. mostly i'm fine, but every now and then they throw a doozy where the divisor (need to check that term) is 13. or something silly like that. am i really expected to check every number between 1 and the one in the fraction before concluding it already IS in its simplest form? perhaps so... i guess i can make a few jumps... some numbers i have tests for divisibility... but i don't think they have given us one for 7 yet... and wiki suggests.. that this gets complicated... and we haven't been introduced to primes yet, either... but perhaps we are just supposed to have figured that out from our times tables??
- multiplying fractions. i'm expected to be able to do that all of a sudden (it feels like) and i don't see why or how i'm supposed to know how to do that... unless... i'm supposed to convert them to decimels, do the multiplication, and then convert them back to fractions. perhaps that is how they want me to do that... there must be a simpler way??? converting fractions to decimels is still pretty new... and all that just to calculate the area of a square / rectangle with fractions in the f*ck*ng sides? for reals?
i think i'm getting a much better handle on... how everything pretty much is built up out of times tables. or, well, that's probably not fair... a LOT of math, i mean, really, quite a lot of it, IS built up out of times tables. they are really important for number sense... and for counting generally... starting to see... i never was shown / never managed to grasp that times tables were built up out of skip counting. i never really got that before.
i'm pretty good with them now... but still have a lot of work to do to get better. some of it is... undoing past habits. i remembered the rule with 9's about taking one away then summing to 9... which is a handy check, to be sure, but isn't so helpful as an initial or primary way of coming to an answer. starting to be more conscientious about building 9's out of 6's out of 3's... visualising...
if i think about how far i've come in such a short space of time, i'm fairly amazed. i think i'm going to be okay. i mean... i have a lot of work to do, to be sure, but i think i'm going to be okay.
i see why wittgenstein (the behaviourist who was skeptical about images in the head / visualisation) was regarded as a sh*tty maths teacher. haha. thinking back... i don't think we were really taught much math in primary school... i mean... i remember doing addition sums and multiplication sums on paper... and they would drill us on our times tables (and i learned how to cheat because i simply didn't remember them). but all this other stuff.. puzzles about distances traveled or displacement or whatever... i'm pretty sure i only remember stuff like that coming up on the standardised PAT tests at the end of each year... and you would just kind of... figure it out as best you could. without any feedback on whether you did it right or not. without any instruction on how to do the ones you didn't see how to do (was there such a thing in primary school?)
- scalene triangles bisected at x 2 and reflected... what are the new co-ordinates of the corners?? get me, too. even rotating some of those... i guess... this is how you develop your visuo-spatial skills (however you spell that). is it cheating to draw them on paper?? i don't suppose it is... i suspect such things get easier / faster / more automatic in time...
- elapsed time. i still have issues with clocks... circles, even. degrees etc. partly because... i think this stuff is a bit harder. partly because... it is a lot less familar to me, i guess.
still have around 5 skills from year 5 to finish up. you need to get a block of about 7 in a row correct to get from 90% mastery to 100%. one mistake... and you get shoved back to 80% or 85%... with a bunch more still... I just can't seem to reliably get them...
I figured... Sometimes it is better to go do something else (like make line graphs) for a while... Or go practice my 4x table for speed... Getting there, I am.
Maybe I'll be a theoretical physicist, yet.
Posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 17:44:11
In reply to Re: i got an interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 25, 2014, at 19:13:22
well, the interview was fairly horrible, i thought.
it is possible that they just want to make me sweat. make sure that i approach the program with the (appropriate) attitude of gratitude and humility. which would be... fair enough, actually. but i don't like being made to sweat :(
i got interviewed by one... then got to meet another. they were both pretty cool actually. seemed to be nice, reasonable people. english, though. the english department gatekeepers. sigh. and it is hard, because i was trying to get exemption from doing english, which they kept telling me was compulsory...
autism came up. i wasn't the one to suggest it. i think people have been talking about me. but when i suggested that... she was like 'no.. i've just met people before and you struck me...' but then when i said about how that was a concern for a med interview she was careful to say that the didn't think the purpose of med interview was to rule out people like me, and she thought there were a whole heap of people like me in med anyways...
i said i didn't want special accommodations... i didn't think i needed them...
but i said that if they were dubious about offering me a place in the program then i had a disability that they should consider, yeah.
:-/
i need this. probably that was they wanted. the threat of tears. they got them.
ugh.
she said that the program was really about giving people a chance who didn't have a chance... but i had a chance... since i did have entry to uni. i said that if it came down to a choice between me and someone who didn't have a chance who would get the chance because of the program (and not someone who wouldn't even attend the program when offered a place / someone who needed to take their rehab year) then... well... that would be a hard decision.
yeah.
i... said i didn't know. because i hadn't met the other applicants. so... i couldn't say who would better use the place.
i think all that was good. i hope they just wanted to make me sweat. probably they did. but one never can tell. i'm scared.
i... really don't have a chance without this.
we'll see. i guess.
Posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 17:59:03
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 17:44:11
i got two of those english questions wrong, too. damn them. i ALWAYS get like 2 or 4 of those little suckers wrong. :(
they have had perfect scores.
sigh. oh english. you were my best subject at school... but you never did like me particularly much.
Posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 19:39:32
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 17:59:03
sigh.
i guess the thing is that it is designed for kids who didn't manage to get entry to university.
to give them a shot at university.
to save them from tech etc, perhaps.
to give them the opportunity to take subjects you can't so much take at tech. subjects like chemistry and geography and english etc.
and... they try and encourage / focus into peoples strengths.
whereas... i'm asking for the opportunity to focus on my weakness. which sounds like a luxury thing in comparison. some kids... well... i guess some kids got all the english questions right - but don't have entry to university. because they got high and missed their exam, or whatever. they had a kid, perhaps. who knows.
i guess i just have to hope that they don't actually have 200 candidates like that. that at least some of them are... wishy washy about whether they want to do this program or whether they want to study... radio or something... whether they want to sit on unemployment for a bit... hang out with their friends and play in a band... whether they are likely to actually commute in through the traffic for a couple hours each day... i just have to hope that there are candidates like that... for whom... it is sufficiently unclear whether they will make something of the opportunity were the opportunity to be offered to them.
i feel bad in a way...
and so... the fact that i can't really do anything else probably comes into play a bit. i mean... i can sit at home on disability... though... i'll lose this home if i don't study at uni full time...
the first person i saw was a professor from english. then i got handed over to the program co-ordinator. i think... the people who do the program... i think they might be more special ed / high school people than uni professor people. i mean... i think that professors do take certain classes etc etc but i think the program people more generally... it is more of a special ed kinda thing. because it basically is at high school level.
so the latter is trickier. because they might not understand quite about how i can't function so well outside the university. and because there can be some... insecurity. fear. stuff... inter-personal dynamic potential difficulty... there is this thing about people thinking that i've learned quite enough already (that i've had better educational opportunity than most in studying places that I have). i had a little trouble connecting with the later person... trying to convey how i didn't really have the opportunity to learn math... how primary school was not a place where i got to learn (since i could guess answers that others receiving instruction for still could not seem to get right) -- but these facts don't win me empathy votes. but i hope she got to see enough of me to give me the opportunity for a place. i said i guessed it depended on the other candidates... that i didn't know because i hadn't met them... i think she seemed to like that. i guess we will just have to wait and see, now.
Posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 21:00:22
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 19:39:32
actually, i suspect the real interview was the last person i saw and the initial part with the English Proff was just to warm me up a bit... Help me relax... Which it did.
Reassure me that I was in the right place. That the program wasn't going to be Tech all over again.
It was harder to connect with the program co-ordinator...
Part of the thing is that this program only costs, like $600 in course fees. It is heavily subsidised. Because it is meant to be helping the kids who don't have a chance...
Whereas doing an ordinary first year... I contribute, like, $6000 in fees. Well... The government does. Via student loan. Which I'll have to start paying back once I earn over the threshold ahahahahaha.
I DO hear / see where she is coming from... But I can't accept it, really. Because I don't stand a chance without the program.
I'm not entirely sure that I sufficiently impressed upon them that I'll probably just stay on disability forever without this... Of course that isn't true... I'd figure something... Sort of... Perhaps...
Let it go, Alex.
There isn't anything more I can do, now.
Relax the rest of today. Tomorrow... Back to the math. 45% of the way though year 6, I am. I got the proficency cert for year 5 - but there are still 5 skills I have yet to get 100% mastery on. Just keep making stupid little errors. I try and get one out first thing in the morning when I'm fresh.
I've just started algebra :) The input-output tables are described by functions (e.g., y=x2) and there is a graph. Ooooooh. I need more work on decimal / fraction conversion... And I think the way I do division is different from the way you are supposed to do long division and decimal division is tripping me up...
Posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 22:49:38
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 21:00:22
of course it is possible that 'english chick' or 'english professor chick' wasn't even from engligh. just borrowed an english person's office.
still... she better be right on where to get those word fridge magnets...
enough!
Posted by alexandra_k on January 29, 2014, at 1:42:01
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 28, 2014, at 22:49:38
aaaah. english chick is married to philosophy guy. or maybe they just have concidentally the same last name. haha. tis a small world.
Posted by europerep on January 29, 2014, at 16:23:38
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 29, 2014, at 1:42:01
Hey alexandra...
I don't usually browse the social forum, but I just came here, mainly because I'm bored, and saw this thread.
I don't know the exact background to what exactly you were interviewing for, but it's about access to some type university course that has entrance restrictions, right? is it something med-related? I think I remember you wanting to get into that. If you like, you can just briefly explain what exactly it is you're trying to get in to... I would like to know that :-)...
Sometimes I can relate to things you say, for example this here:
> so the latter is trickier. because they might not understand quite about how i can't function so well outside the university.
For me it's kind of like, I myself don't understand how I function so badly outside of university while I'm doing so well "inside" it. I'm not even sure whether my teachers would say that I'm doing particularly well, but I do get good grades, so I must be doing something right.
But I'm not really sure how I can translate that into getting somewhere. I mean getting grades is one thing, but getting into a PhD program where you compete with other good students who have not spent a third of their life lying on their bed apathetically and wishing they were dead, is something else entirely. Plus I'm far from having actually recovered, I'm just doing better now. But noone is going to give me anything "because you've have come a long way", I'll either get somewhere on my own merits, or I won't get there at all. And I would do so much better if I were even just a little further on my path away from depression. Ugh, I don't know...Not sure whether this makes sense to you. But, yeah, as I said, sometimes you post things I think I can identify with, and since noone else had replied yet, I just thought I'd go ahead...
Posted by alexandra_k on January 29, 2014, at 22:31:58
In reply to Re: horrible interview » alexandra_k, posted by europerep on January 29, 2014, at 16:23:38
Hi. It is a sort of a bridging course. I didn't realize before how cumulative science was and just how much math was required to do university physics etc. So it is basically a year where I try and get from where I am now... To where the high school kids are at. So I have a chance competing against them for a place in medicine 2015. If I did the Bio-Med year this year... I wouldn't have a hope, really.
They say: 'This program is for people who want to begin studying at tertiary level but have left school with minimal or no qualifications'.
The selection criterion involves such things as, being motivated to do it, not having too many other demands to juggle. Etc etc. I've seen it. I'd score highly at it.
The sticking point (insofar as there is one) is the program co-ordinator. A sort of... Personality clash. Of the sort that I found at tech, really. She sends out emails with lots of FUNNY TYPE FONTS. Lots more text than strictly necessary and stuff in red, underlined etc. During the testing she was talking to us - saying we could start reading our test scripts - and saying we could start filling in an application form... All at once. I wondered at the time 'is she TRYING to overload people? is she TRYING to get people filling in their application form rather than spending their precious 30 minutes actually doing the test? Is she TRYING to weed out those with attention difficulties?'. She didn't seem to be trying to make it easy for anybody... Then when we had started doing the tests she started having a conversation with someone who asked her something... Then was wandering around talking to people...
I just... Really struggle with people like that. She's the program co-ordinator... The gatekeeper.. But... One voice in many. I think I got the English chick onside (she is the English tutor - and she seemed supportive of my not doing English). She was reluctant to tell me what score I got in Math... But she didn't seem... Appalled. So I think I did okay-ish. Okay-ish to be considered for science math. Maybe because x did = 2 after all.
I think the science people will want me.
Anyway... She is the program co-ordinator... Not the tutor. And a committee decides, of which she is one voice. So... She's just... She just represents the attitude I've had all along... People couldn't stop me being good at reading. SO they tried to prevent me doing other things. Because it wouldn't have been fair if I was good at other things too... They aren't like this with everybody, though. So... I don't quite understand why it is that people really turn on / don't like ME. Why they don't like ME succeeding or achieving or whatever.
She asked me how old I was too. Which you aren't allowed to do. And she asked me whether I thought I was too old to be a surgeon. And I said they weren't allowed to discriminate on the basis of age. And she said 'yeah, they can say that but they probably do that anyway'. And I was like 'yeah, and there really aren't any female engineers either, so I may as well just give up right now' (extending). And she was like... No... There are LOTS of female engineers. Which of course... There aren't. But I wasn't going to get into an argument with her about that anymore than I was going to get into an argument with the health science intake person after she said it was harder to get in here than it was to get into melbourne or sydney medical programs (there are stats on that, and there are rankings on institutions and that simply isn't true). why do people talk???
HOly crap.
If you get good grades then you are doing well. What do you do? What field are you in? Would you like to do a PhD somewhere? Getting a place in one is a lot about luck. I know someone who applied to, like, 9 places. She only got on offer: from her 'dream' institution. The lower ranked ones she thought she'd definately get an offer from passed her over. If you want to do it and your grades are good you should go for it. More grad students spend a much greater portion of their lives lying in bed apathetically wishing they were dead than you might think.
Posted by alexandra_k on January 30, 2014, at 14:41:38
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 29, 2014, at 22:31:58
It is possible I'm not quite being fair... I did say that I was happy not to unenroll from the Bio-Med courses I'm currently enrolled in for a while yet since they have started to make course books available. If I can get all the course books... I can get a good head start on the material over next summer, you see... And if I get a place in this program.. Well.. Apparently they will take over my enrollment (not giving me any opportunity to hold off accepting a place).
But I do feel fairly angry that I wasn't given opportunity at primary school and... That this same attitude crops up now. At tech. And potentially at uni, too. I think... Honestly... It is an attitude mostly found in people who aren't particularly bright... And - actually most importantly - people who weren't taught / didn't themselves get the opportunity to acquire various skills.
I mean... With the email thing... I don't know why nobody tells her 'email them as you want them to email others. Teach them how to email professionally. Courteous greeting, keep the message as simple as possible, courteous goodbye'. Otherwise, how are they supposed to learn? You want to get a bunch of first assignments (too) in pretty colors on weird sorts of paper etc etc? Of course not! Preparing people for university study... Sigh.
Controlling your attention to focus on what is important IS hard. You need to start really small and only build up distractors once you have been taught how to focus. Why is it that the educationally disadvantaged are the ones to find themselves in the most scattered, distraction filled environments? Who are bombarded with emails telling them false things like "FINAL OPPORTUNITY TO SIT DIAGNOSTIC TESTING IF YOU DO NOT ATTEND YOUR APPLICATION WILL NOT BE FURTHER CONSIDERED" every few days. Teaching people how to ignore instructions (since they are filled with content that simply isn't true?) Reinforcing their current inability to follow instructions?
How do these people manage to get themselves into these employment positions? Or... How is it that they weren't sent on training courses etc etc etc in order to knock this sort of stuff out of them????? I simply... Don't understand. I don't understand. I really don't believe that I ever will understand this.
I remember at tech... People really seemed to hate... Or... sometimes grudgingly admire one of the guys there. He was the most athletic by a long shot. Tall guy, too. Big. Over 6 foot. Probably around 105kg. Boxer. He worked really very hard -- and he simply was better at most things. Everything, really. Flexibility, even. Balance. Weird stuff like that. Could triple under with a jump rope. Said he did years of jump rope for boxing...
What I didn't understand... Was why the tutors didn't get him into something REAL. Get NZ selectors interested in him or something. Because he was miles ahead of the other kids... And motivated... I didn't think he was particularly dumb... He had sports-smarts... And he'd sit up the front and really pay attention in class... And they just sort of mucked about with him after class etc. Instead of trying to get him into proper training. Introducing him to proper trainers. Why didn't they try and help him up?
Instead... They seemed to think he had enough already. He didn't really get anything from them... ANy extra encouragment or anything... Really... Nobody did. But the whole class (practically) would groan when he won a contest or something. Even though he was a nice guy. With never a bad word. Nobody delighted in his achievements or anything...
I don't understand how people can be so mean spirited. Clip the wings off angels people would. Get me far far far far far away from people such as these...
I would like to meet the tutors for the program. Because if this year turns out to be another year of being given instructions that nobody expects anybody to follow... If we are given ill information etc etc... Well... I have concerns.. Most of the lecturers have PhDs... But I also know it is NOT the end of the world if you don't (I tell myself)... I've met people who have done the program and they said it served them well... But they didn't come from university study to the program. I don't know how they would find going from university study to the program... Co-ordinator person isn't a tutor... She is an administrator (I think). Deep breaths. Deep breaths...
If I don't get a place... I can get the course books for bio-med. So I won't be going into next year cold. Got one of them... And there is a bunch of embryology (very early cell development) stuff I've never really seen... They are pretty clear on what stuff you need to know... Keeping it simple... The material... Accumulates into masses... Quite by itself... Without any need of you messing things up with your fonts and irrelevant information...
Do 'related but different' papers... Animal biology rather than human (since there is a lot of overlap). There is a prepratory physics paper and a prepratory chemistry paper, too. There isn't a lower level math paper. I guess I'd just cut myself back to part time status (would need to talk to accom people here... HOpefully it would be alright given some special pleading...) and learn the math in my own time.
What f*cks me off is that I f*ck*ng well DID go back to High School. Sort of. I bombed out my last year of High School. So I moved to a different school as an adult student. I went through a year of hell of all the high school social sh*t crap in order to get my entry to uni. The people applying for this program... Why don't they do that? It is an option for them, surely. WHereas me, now. 35 years old... C'mon... It isn't an option for me...
Posted by alexandra_k on January 30, 2014, at 15:59:47
In reply to Re: horrible interview, posted by alexandra_k on January 30, 2014, at 14:41:38
when i asked why she talked, i didn't mean *generally*. i meant... i didn't understand why she said certain particular things. like the thing about my age. what was the point of that? to see how i handle inappropriate questions in a formal setting? thats being a bit too charitable on my part, i think... i don't win empathy votes by wondering why people talk, too. i know that. i wondered it out loud to someone before and she... wanted to murder me, i think.
i must be the one who lacks empathy, yeah?
i worry a bit because they say this course is 9-5. if what they *mean* to say is something along the lines of - we expect that you will treat it like a full time job with the amount of study etc you do of it - then that is fine. of course.
if they mean we have to spend hours sitting in class because they are trying to keep us off streets in order to, say, keep the crime rate down, like what tech was all about... hours of sitting in noisy classrooms so that it took far longer than it needed to to do tasks (since you can't focus in such environments) all for the purposes of making busy-work for us... when i think of how much work i've actually got to do on math and on learning the stuff for embryology etc... don't even get me started on chemical functional groups... if they are planning on spamming up our lives into 9-5...
i'm scared.
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