Which academic concepts or ideas do you not only get, but had an embarrassingly easy time understanding?
For me, there are three:
Spelling. I’ve always spelled correctly. I think it’s partly because I’m a synesthete, and words just look wrong when they’re not spelled correctly. But in any case, once I learn a word, I don’t usually misspell it.
Balancing chemical equations. I remember hearing horror stories in high school about Chemistry class and how hard the equation balancing section was. Since I was good but not stellar in science (I got A’s, but I didn’t light up the world with my brilliance or anything), I expected to struggle with it just like everybody else, but it just…clicked. Immediately. I barely had to look at the equations and I just knew how they fit together. It was kind of weird, because math-type things were never my best subjects (I was an English and writing geek). I ended up getting an A+ on my test for that unit in Chemistry.
Writing in general. I’ve just always had a feel for how words go together, ever since I was a small child. That doesn’t mean I was any good at nuts-and-bolts things like diagramming sentences (boring!) but I think that was because I felt like it was a waste of time when I could already produce a perfectly grammatically correct sentence without having to go through all those other useless steps.
How about you?
Spelling. Balancing chemical equations. Mitosis. Probability. The Quadratic Equation.
I’m sure there are many other things, but this is all I can think of currently.
Maximization of a function in Calculus. It was obvious to me even before I got taught it that a function reaches a local maximum, minimum, or inflection point when the derivative is zero.
At school age about 13 - 3D trigonometry => I just loved calculating angles and lengths to find the unknowns. Also ‘got’ solving simultaneous equations with the matrix method, no-one else in the class did.
Language, specifically the written word. I’ve been writing since I could hold a pen… as soon as I figured out how to read, I was writing. I don’t remember the learning process, I just remember finally having a way to make concrete the stories in my head. I wrote hours a day as a child, which turned into an obsession for writing fiction. I saved my money for a word processor and bought that when I was 13… notice I say a word processor, not a computer… the only function of this thing I blew $350 on was to write fiction. I finally finished my first novel when I was 16. While the ink was still drying on the last sentence I was starting on the second draft. I created color coded tabs and folders for everything and began systematically analyzing it. Nobody taught me how to write a novel, hack out the structure, revise it and turn it into a polished piece. I just did it.
When I wrote my statement of purpose for grad school, my professor, who is notoriously critical, said it was the best statement of purpose she’d ever written and wondered if I’d considered a career in journalism. My interviewer also had nothing but praise for it. I’m not arrogant about much, but I am a damned good writer. I’m no one-trick pony either… I’m fluent in many different styles, and am adept at code-switching.
Obviously one of the reasons I write well is because I have endless passion for it. I have no greater love. When I’m ‘‘in the zone’’ nothing else matters… not food, not people, not sleep. It’s the most fantastic high there is. So why, after years of chasing this high, would I not be good?
I’m reading this book about graduate school, where it talks about the dreaded doctoral dissertation. It sounds like so much fun! I don’t doubt the research part will be hard work, and I’m sure there will be some very frustrating roadblocks, but I feel blessed that writing and polishing a 300 page document doesn’t intimidate me in the least. In fact, I look forward to it, because I know I will really enjoy doing it well.
Of course now there will be 20 errors in this post. :smack:
English here too. Which is strange cuz English isn’t even my first language (Chinese is, followed closely by leetspeak), but from middle school on up, I’d very often end up at the top of my writing classes and beat out even native speakers. Though you’d never guess it by how I write here, my essays and writings (from classes all across the board) were usually the highest-graded and were more than occasionally Xeroxed and distributed as examples. Even in university, I’d surprise teachers and would frequently be called “eloquent” – it’s one of the first things people tell me about myself, at which point I’d just chuckle and consciously try to be less snobby.
What’s funny is that I look like the stereotypical Asian FOB, what with the geek glasses, standard nonhaircut and faux-retro generic 90s clothing; add the “Confucius say” accent that comes out when I’m not careful and it’s an absolute miracle I haven’t been tried for plagiarism yet. To top it off, I also excelled in math classes until I stopped taking them. That’s gotta violate some fundamental law of the universe.
Linguistics. I seem to get it intuitively. This helps a lot with learning foreign languages - I learn them easily, to a simple level at least, and find ‘passive’ language knowledge (reading and listening) really easy.
I was in 3rd (or 4th) grade, and sitting in my room studying & puzzling over my times facts, which I had been struggling with for awhile. I remember gazing at a times table for a number of minutes. Then all of a sudden out of the blue the entire effin’ thing came to me all at once-I could see all the interlocking patterns, how each problem related to a number of others, and so on and on-the forest and the trees simultaneously. I remember I came rushing downstairs to tell my parents-I don’t know I was able to get across what I had experienced to them very well tho. The facts troubled me not one whit from then on. When I teach them to my students I invariably try a similar holistic approach in the hopes that it will “click” for them like it did for me-no luck yet tho.
I’ve been reading since before the first grade. I’m pretty sure I could read in pre-school. I cannot recall a time when I couldn’t read. My mom was fooled for a while, in fact: She thought I was really good at memorizing because I knew all these Dr. Seuss books and could read along with her. The irony is that I have a poor memory. I was still reading Poe by the third grade.
Spelling. I don’t recall not knowing how to spell most words, and misspelled words always bothered me.
Writing. I’ve never had a problem putting pen to paper (or, nowadays, fingers to keyboard) and composing something. I guess I was the weird kid at school who actually looked forward to essays and compositions. As an adult, I’ve written professionally, and I continue to write for myself.
Language and linguistics. I never had a problem learning languages, and managed to learn French and Russian by the time I was 22. And, discovering the study of linguistics during my undergrad days was a treat–suddenly, I understood what was happening in the languages I was studying, which only helped me learn them.
Reading. Languages. Writing. Certain “softer” sciences just make sense to me, like sociology, anthro, psych (although some individual theories are well, creative). Metaphor, symbolism, analogy (most of the time); poetry (not necc. modern poetry).
Grammar makes an intuitive sense to me, and I understood English much better when I took German.
Systems makes sense to me–the component parts. I don’t mean the internal combustion engine, but social systems and structures and processes.
Wow, everyone’s saying languages. Well, it’s true for me as well. I rocked in English grammar, style, spelling - you name it. This no doubt led to my current profession. I was quite good in French before I moved here, and learning Spanish conjugation seemed to be way easier for me than for everyone else in the class.
“Word problems” in math. I can’t understand how someone can be perfectly able to solve for x in 3x+4=13, yet be totally helpless when asked what number, when multiplied by 3, is 4 less than 13.
Languages. I have the “language bug.” In school while all the rest of the kids were struggling to learn irregular verb conjugations, I was the kid who was looking ahead in the book and dying to learn what came next. This one paid off.
Spelling. I think it’s from reading so much, I just kind of know how words are spelled. But then again, it might not be, because I spell quite well in all the languages I speak, even the ones where I’m not as experienced in reading. But I’ve won medals for spelling and never cracked a spelling book.
Music. Rhythm has always come naturally to me, I’ve never not been able to keep time or carry a tune or count beats.
More in the home-ec realm, while I sucked at practical sewing (“what do you mean, my seam’s not straight? It looks fine! Close enough!”), I took to decorative sewing very handily.
Yup, all the language stuff: grammar, spelling, what have you. I was an early and voracious reader, and now I work as a copyeditor. Go figure.
I loved math too. Love word problems and algebra and geometry. But statistics was a bit of a stumbling block and a snore to boot. Of course I’ve parlayed that into an editing sideline and occasionally work on math textbooks, algebra through calculus, and also physics, chemistry, and other sciences.
Oddly, I didn’t do so well at balancing chemical equations. Easy ones, sure, but when it got into the ones that required chemical knowledge, I kept trying to impose algebraic logic on them. Doesn’t work that way.
You know, the whole nature vs. nuture “debate”. In an advanced social science course everyone else was debating past each other. I don’t think that there’s any great debate, I mean, if everyone is born with a ‘blank slate’ then…