this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2025
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Don't be mean. I promise to do my best to judge that fairly.
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My wife is really smart and says she just "sees" the answer to math problems. Ask her to multiple two 3-digit numbers and she does it quickly in her head. Was never like that for me, I always have to work the process even for simple things, it's never obvious. I got a CS degree with a math minor, and took some pretty high level math classes. It was always the same for me: learn the process, then work it through, whether it's number theory or multiplying two numbers.
My wife didn't get a degree, but she went back to school as an adult. When she got to the first math class that had symbolic/algebraic notation, she ground to a halt initially. She couldn't just see the answer, and she had no practice working through the process. Was a real slog for her.
Being brilliant is a gift, but you need to learn to work the mental muscles too.
This is basically why I believe that effortless As in grade school are a failure state for kids. People tell me that mu standards are too high for my kid, but I cannot express to them that now is the time for my kid to build up the ability to struggle and persevere. It's not that I have high standards. I just think that a perfect score is a sign that the task wasn't hard enough.
I saw way too many kids burn out in college because they'd never seem a grade below an A before, let alone the C they just scored. Since I was used to being pushed to my limit in grade school (not by my mother, but by teachers), I was fully prepared to work hard to barely make a B sometimes.
I think learning to be happy with a B is an important skill. I don't believe that As should be effortless. If an A is effortless, then that means the kid wasn't in a challenging enough class. In real life the only reward for hard work is more work. Leaning when they want to push for the A and when they want to be content with a B is an important think for them to decide. Perfection should never be the goal. That's how kids burn out at the college level.