Most people don’t use math in their careers. Most people rarely use anything other than basic math in their daily lives. So, for most people, learning math is a waste of time, right?
Nope.
Nearly all of the benefits of studying math have nothing to do with math. Math is brain training, pure and simple.
Brain Muscles
The various types of math problems students do are like the various kinds of exercise you do at the gym. Rock climbers, football players, and skiers all lift weights at the gym, not because they do any of the same lifting motions during their sports, but because their athletic performance benefits from having stronger muscles in general.
As I often say, your brain is like a bunch of muscles that get stronger when you use them. There isn’t a “math muscle” in your brain. Rather, math exercises several important mental muscles that everyone needs.
Logic
Math is sometimes described as “the language of logic” because all math must make sense. Everything in math, from 2+2=4 to the way you calculate a derivative, is something that can be explained and understood logically. None of it is arbitrary.
A common mistake students make is to simply memorize formulas without ever trying to understand them. This might result in a good test score, but it doesn’t give you the benefit of exercising your brain’s logic muscle. Plus, if you focus on understanding the formulas, they’re easier to remember.
Problem-Solving
Another critical skill that math strengthens is problem-solving. Math trains you to wrestle with complicated, multi-step problems where the correct path forward is not obvious. Life is full of problems like that.
When you solve a word problem in math, you’re forced to do the following:
- Account for what you know
- Determine what you don’t know that would be helpful to know
- Discard useless or distracting information
- Set aside information that you’ll need later but don’t need right now
- Assess what resources you have available (formulas, methods, etc.)
- Sort out how to get where you want to go
- Adapt that plan of action as you work the problem, if you discover it needs to change
That’s what word problems in math are all about, and it’s also what problem-solving in general is all about. You could be remodeling a kitchen, planning a vacation, or designing a website, and the essential skills of problem-solving would be the same.
Flexibility
Lastly, math is an excellent way to develop greater mental flexibility.
Many areas of mathematics, such as quadratics or integrals, have numerous methods that you could use for any given problem. As you learn them, you accumulate a toolkit. Your job as a math student is to flexibly switch from one tool to another as needed.
Many students express frustration that there isn’t one way to solve all such problems – one tool that you always use. It would be easier if you always knew which method to use, but that wouldn’t help you learn how to solve problems in the real world.
In just about any career, you’ll be faced with novel challenges every day: new problems to solve with the toolkit you’ve acquired through college, on-the-job training, and experience. If the problems were easy and simple to solve, you wouldn’t be getting paid good money to solve them. The work would be outsourced to a cheaper labor source, an algorithm, or an AI.
Whether you’re an electrician, a doctor, an engineer, a project manager, or a carpenter, your job is to solve hard problems by drawing upon your knowledge and grabbing the right tools at the right times. Many branches of mathematics train your brain to do exactly that.
It’s Never Been About the Math
Whenever math students are asked to learn something esoteric, someone will complain, “But when are we ever going to use this?”
The correct answer to this question is, “Probably never. But also, always.”
You’ll most likely never use this specific piece of mathematics for anything practical, but you will certainly use the mental muscles and general skills you’re developing by learning it.
Remember, the point of school is not the specific things you learn, but who you become through the learning.
Chris Loper has been working as a tutor and academic coach since 2014, racking up over 13,000 hours of experience supporting students.
Along with Greg Smith, Chris is the co-creator of Parenting for Academic Success, a series of classes that create empowered parents, confident students, and harmonious families.
Chris writes the popular self-improvement blog Becoming Better, where he also offers habit coaching, helping busy adults with habit formation and productivity.
Chris’s most recent endeavor combines his academic and habit-formation expertise to help students thrive in college. Visit SmartCollegeHabits.com to learn more.
In 2021, he published a humorous memoir titled Wood Floats and Other Brilliant Observations, a book that blends crazy stories with practical life lessons.
He lives in Issaquah, WA, where he is the owner of South Cove Tutoring.