Aceing A-Maths

If it is not obvious from my own blog, I do ok in my maths, especially probability and statistics. But it hasn't always been so.

I had been aceing my way in Maths from kindergarten all the way to Sec. 2. It had seemed effortless to me at times. Until A. Maths came along.

Sec. 3 represented the jump from E. Maths (Elementary Mathematics) to A. Maths (Advanced Mathematics). I struggled with it immensely during the initial months. Not only did I not ace it, I failed it. And all the A. Maths teacher could offer in terms of advice to the class was practice, practice and more practice.

So we did. All of us diligently bought our 10-year series (actually, mine was more like 30-year series with questions from as early as the late 60s!) and tried every single question in the topics that had been taught up till then.

Still, there was only a marginal improvement in my grades (and my understanding of the topics). I started passing, but only barely. What's more, I started hating Maths. The final straw for me came during the mid-year exams. Still not much of a discernible improvement despite the extra hard work put in.

During the June holidays, I decided drastic action was needed. First and foremost, I threw away my 30-year series. And I promised myself I will only spend time doing the questions given as homework. But I made sure I really really gave these questions a proper go and workout.

What resulted was an exponential increase in my free time. And I no longer hated Maths. I accepted my deficiencies in it and just gave it my best shot. Slowly, the interest came back and I started going back to re-reading the A. Maths textbook because I was interested, not because I had to.

The pickup in grades began towards the end of Sec. 3. But what really and totally restored my self-confidence and interest in it was my Sec. 4 prelim exams. I hit the heights of 88 (geez, I remember the strangest and most minute details, don't I?!) in it.

I've learnt my lesson in learning and have since applied this newly discovered hypothesis to all subjects, courses, modules I've undertaken. It still works.