Growing up, I was always in the smart groups. I wasn’t the smart kid, but I was damn proud of my reading skills. I attended a Montessori elementary school, and I was in the group of kids reading the more advanced books. I remember there was few enough of us that we sat at a table rather than in the area where large groups gathered on the floor. In middle school, I was in a group of four kids in my 6th grade block class that was supposed to read more advanced books. One of them was The Hobbit, though as far as I remember, I never read it. Man, those were the days. My free time was spent reading and writing. I miss reading like that.
In middle school, as a 6th grader, I also was allowed in the 7+ math class, which was literally an 8th grade math class. I was so bored in my 6th grade math class. If I remember correctly, I wasn’t doing so hot close to when I got moved up. My parents will have to correct me, but I believe their reasoning was I was doing poorly, because of my boredom.
Maybe that’s true and obviously I handled the classes successfully enough to pass with good grades, but there are times where I think I was just…bored. The way the classes were taught was uninteresting to me. Once I hit calculus, my “ability” to do math was done. I just didn’t get it. In college, I flew by Computational Discrete Math course. That’s all about following algorithms and patterns; it was a breeze. Theory of Discrete Math? Big fail on me. And I took that f’ing class twice.
A week or so ago, someone tweeted a link to Millennial Marketing on whether or not Gen Y Suffers From Lack of Failure. (Are you sensing a theme here? Just be glad I made these things separate posts.)
Phase 2 stuck to me. “Kids that had been initially been praised for their smarts….were easily discouraged.” Is that me? This isn’t something I can cookie cutter fit myself into. (Cue bringing my mother into the discussion as she generally already knows these answers.)
I ran into issues with math, and I gave up figuring it out. That isn’t something I like. At some point in my life, I will break down and buy the Head First Algebra book, so I can actually learn Algebra. (My school system was silly and taught me “integrated math” where I had/have no clue specifically what algebra, geometry, etc were.) In the mean time, I just don’t think about it. I pursue what I’m “naturally” good at: programming.
Except there I can’t decide whether I’m moving away at a time I have experienced challenges or if I am exploring a new challenge. Truthfully, it’s a little of both. However, in accepting a job, I have accepted the new challenge for a long haul. To be honest, I am excited about the prospect of focusing on one “challenge” for a longer than three months engagement.
So, verdict still out on whether the points in this article fit me.
