I did think that tere would be more stress put on the importance of math in asian countries than there is here mostly, (and maybe it's true, but i've recently discovered it doesn't really carry over either way) but i always know that being from a certain place, or being a certain gender doesn't make you good, or bad at something..
At the same time, however, having people EXPECT you to do better CAN make you better. If everyone in your class thinks your going to get an A, and everyone in that class acts shocked and hurt if you DON'T get an A, you're going to be annoyed...but you're also going to try just a little bit harder so that you don't put up with it. A lot of the divsions in subjects by race or gender comes from expectations like that-if you do bad, and everyone expects you to do bad, no one really cares. If you do bad when everyone expects miricles, suddenly it's like you personally heralded in the end of the universe.

That contradicts what you said before about smart kids blocking out all the bad marks. I'm actually really interested in knowing what you say to that, because I want to know if you can prove there's a difference.

And, on a more school-like topic, on another forum I went to, a person had only learned linear relations and equations in grade 10, while I'm learning the basics in grade 8. I want to know when you guys learned it (if you have yet).
Well, I'm finally done with "Un sac de billes", along with the test, and the next big things I have are a Géographie project - Le problème de l'eau (lit. the problem of water - pollution and running out)- and a Science project - pretend to be an adult and explain your healthy (or unhealthy, and explain what's missing) diet every day (according to the latest Canada Food Guide To Healthy Eating - or something like that). I have a dietician as a substitute while my teacher goes on the March of the Living.

Um, I learned linear relations in Prob and Stats this year, and I'm in 11th grade!! Oh man, I feel dumb. Haha.

March of the Living? What's that?

Well, I guess I really amlearning things quickly. But we haven't learned about algebra with exponents, like x-3y^2=6x.
The March of the Living is a trip organized for people to go around the continents on the other half of the globe where the concentration camps were (Holocaust) and to see some of them, before arriving at the final destination; Israel. For more information, look at Wikipedia.

I might edit this later - I have to finish my homework and go to sleep.

Hmmm...I had an equation almost exactly like that in my schoolwork a couple of weeks ago, vashmata...in fact I'm going to have a test on similar ones in a day or so...I think they're fun!

I said that people block it out when a smart kid gets a bad grade...i didn't say they do it right away. There's a period of shocked looks, and everyone joking...A couple times i've had people cheer that they did better than me....

When you've taken your next test, however, they've completly forgotten all about that bad grade, so that they can go on about how you ALWAYS get good grades...As long as you continue to get regular good grades, they'll block out the bad stuff so that they can rant about it, and give you shocked looks...

While it might not last, those few minutes when people are acting, even jokingly, like you somehow betrayed them by getting a grade lower than you were supposed to goees a LONG towards making people want to do better.

I understand that...

Nice analysis, yr.

Ack, my mom's yelling at me to go do schoolwork, so I'd better go...Ironic, isn't it?

vashmata- Are linear relations and equations anything like graphing linear equations? Because I learned that last year in Algebra and I'm a freshman.

Our school offers time off (Renaissance days) school if you get a high GPA, and I'm taking a day tomorrow to go shopping, so that should be fun.

Erm we're doing geometry patterns and I need to go color mine...also I have to study for science. I did take my Constitution test today--which I have to pass to graduate--and I think I did okay. At least, I hope so.

Well, I don't know exactly how school in USA works, so I want to know if it's grade 8, 9 ,10, or 11. And this would be a big question, with most of what we leaned being applied: x-3y=6x find the x-intersect, the y-intersect and the slope, and graph it on the cartesian plane. The most recent problem I got: Find the equation of the line going through: a. (2,5), (5,11).

I said it before, but in French, we're doing a play Chinese-style (behind the curtains so you only see shadows) on "Le Petit Prince", and I'm going to be playing a part in it, and playing guitar for background music. So far, the only thing I need to learn is Fur Elise.

An tomorrow is Yom Ha-atzmaut, or, in English, (the Israeli) Independance Day, so, as usual, my school is going to the annual rally [along with the super-orthodox extremist Jews that always protest (which I never actually see) - whoopee].

Ah, yes vashmata, that seems like what my schoolbooks say is the graphing of linear equations. Nicely explained, by the way, my schoolbook didn't explain it that clearly.

And it depends. Freshman in highschool (which is what I'm guessing eowyngirl was speaking of) would be 9th grade.

Hohoho. Ok, so if eownygirl is in grade 9, then that's normal, because this year, the government made us learn this stuff a year early, not three.

Woah! Fur Elise is a lot harder than it seems on guitar. I can't even get the beginning perfect yet. Then again, I did only start today .

Well, at 11:36PM, I guess it's best to see what homework i have for tomorrow.

Yeah, that's exactly what I did last year in 8th grade, and we just finished reviewing it in my geometry class. Le Petit Prince sounds like fun. Happy Israeli Independence Day!

Yeah, tomorrow I have to go to a new classroom because my old one is being redone now. Why they do this towards the end of the year is beyond my comprehension but yeah. So, my teacher isn't very happy about this. But on the bright side he doesn't have to pack much when school is done.

I made a new culture in Psychology... well it's for Sociology but it's the same class. Anyway, yeah we were in groups of four and we made a new culture called Jorient. It's Jewish and Orientals (Asians) mixed as one. And it's the _ethnically_ Jewish people. Haha. We had fun with this project. But there were other people in my class that kept thinking that our teacher wanted us to be racist and choosing one race for our culture. Which isn't true, my group caught on with the lesson. It was pretty hard though because we were making a culture not a country.

We had to base our culture off of a cereal box that we had. Ours was Frosted Cheerios. So we were wealthy farmers. And we were very healthy and active. And charitable because there was a charitable thing on our box. That was a really funny project.

Man...I've beeen gone so long I almost forgot my password.

Anyway, at my school you can learn lines in either eighth(me!) or ninth. Maybe you don't learn lines in ninth if you're in super remedial math.... This year's calc! But I have A.P. exams this week...so even math can't make me too happy about it.