Preparing for a College Major in STEM

Preparing for a College Major in STEM As a math and physics dual major, I found my university level math and physics classes both challenging and rewarding. The challenge forced me to become a better version of myself and to continually strive to achieve a better understanding of the universe and the logical structures we use to describe it.At many schools, the math and physics majors have a reputation for being some of the most difficult. As people gravitate towards STEM majors, the competition to get into and do well in these classes is intensifying. Many of these courses are graded on a curve, and this means competing against your fellow students. Moreover, the early classes set the foundation for understanding those that follow. As a prospective STEM major, it is worth evaluating how prepared you are to take these classes and the possibility of preparing additionally ahead of these tough classes.Having a strong math background is critical for all prospective STEM majors. Mathematics is the language of science, and wi thout a firm grip on the underlying mathematics, many classroom explanations can fall flat. Strong algebra skills are a must for all STEM disciplines, and strong pre-calculus and calculus skills are especially important for physics.   Simple algebraic mistakes are often punished just as severely as fundamental misunderstandings in university freshman level calculus and physics series. AJ Tutoring excels at helping students bolster key study skills including a refined approach to mathematics that can help minimize mistakes and maximize understanding.The SAT Math II Subject Test provides a good assessment of how strong a student’s precalculus skills are.   If you are in the high 700’s, you can be relatively sure that you have a solid grounding in algebra and precalculus.   There are a couple topics that could warrant some extra review if you don’t feel super confident about them: specifically, vectors, polar and parametric functions.The AP exams in Calculus and Physics are quite a bit more complicated. First, they may or may not be acceptable for credit at the school of your choice. Second, regardless of whether they are accepted for credit, they may or may not be a good substitute for the class itself. The AP curriculum for both calculus and physics tends to omit and deemphasize certain topics that will become important in following classes, and the AP tests themselves are often curved so that a 5 may represent an inadequate understanding (especially with cutoffs for that score typically in the 60% range.) Regardless of whether you are offered credit for these foundational classes, it may be best to retake the class at the university level. Many university professors have old finals available online. These can be a great tool in assessing whether or not it would be worthwhile to retake a specific class.Freshman level calculus and physics classes tend to be considered ‘weeder’ classes for the engineering discipline (even if you aren’t on that track), and are often populated with very high level students. Even so, in my experience, I have seen failure and drop rates as high as 50%.   When confronted with these rather dire statistics, my professor’s comment was, “I need to make sure that if any of you actually wind up becoming engineers that you know your stuff. If my kids are driving over a bridge you designed and it collapses, it will be my fault.” My professors had a minimum level of competence they would accept, and they did not hesitate to fail anyone they did not perceive to be up to their standards.Some advice: Attempt a final for any class you are thinking of skipping. Spend some time digging into any missing concepts. There are online lecture series, videos and books which are great resources. An experienced tutor can also provide guidance, structure and motivation.One last piece of advice: A good general rule for any STEM major (outside of the biological sciences) is to always take at least one math class. If you are always taking a relevant math class, it should be relatively easy to stay on top. Also, don’t take classes you lack the math background for.   For instance, typical second semester physics curriculum (electromagnetism) relies heavily on vector calculus. At the very least be concurrently enrolled; though this doesn’t ensure you will have the math during the course, you should at least have it ahead of your final. Many universities also have mathematical methods for physical sciences classes which are a great way to start your upper division studies.AJ tutoring is happy to provide additional advice for our graduating students, and to help ensure our students are well prepared to succeed as they transition to university.  If you’d like to learn more about our approach, please contact us today!

LOI Participates in English Day at Swedish School

LOI Participates in English Day at Swedish School LOI recently took part in  an English Day at  the request of a longtime student, Frank. Frank teaches English and Spanish to middle school students in Sweden. He  asked  LOI to offer our live classes to  a group of his 13 and 14 year old students as part of English Day, so that they would have the chance to talk with native speakers.We were excited to have the opportunity to work with Frank and give this  group of young learners the chance to really use their English.We broke them into six groups of 4 students each. Each group  met an LOI English teacher by Skype. The classes were focused around conversation and dealt with topics interesting to teenagers, like violence and bullying in school, dress codes and appearances, the importance  of education and whether  money makes you happy. Here is what Franks students had to say about our classes:The teacher’s name was David. He was the British teacher and he was very  funny. He made a lot of jokes and was very open and polite. He talke d all the  time and asked us a lot of things and was very good at making the  conversation flow. So we think the teacher was very good and funny and I’m  happy that we got him. The good thing was that we lost track of the topic and  talked about many other things in a natural way. Anyways this idea with  Skype was very fun and a great way to learn English. It was funnier to speak  on Skype instead of writing and stuff.  We used the video so we could see each other and that was a lot easier.    Julia, Linn, Elliot and Filip (group 3).Everyone in our group think that it was very funny to talk to someone who  just speaks English and not understood Swedish. In that way we had to speak  English and it turn into a real conversation. Muireann was really kind and she  talked so we could understand her. We understood what she said and it was  really easy to talk with her. We would love to do this again. We recommend  this program to other schools because we learned a lot by talking. It w as easy  to use Skype.  Elsa, Fillipa, Felicia and Linus (group 2).Our Skype teacher was Mark. He is an American, from California. He is funny and really  cool. We discussed different topics and when we could not find words he helped us. It is  much better than learning English in class. It is also better to speak with somebody from  a country where they speak English. It is also better because you can ´t speak Swedish  with that person so you have to speak English whole the time.  We think that using Skype for learning English in school is awesome and we would love  to do it again.  Alva, Magdalena, Isak and Hampus (group 6).If you are interested in having an English Day with your students, or have other interesting ideas for our classes, please contact us!