This U.S. Olympiad Coach Has a Unique Approach to Math

Po-Shen Loh believes math education needs an overhaul. And he knows a thing or two about it—he's resurrected the United States International Mathematical Olympiad team, leading it to four first-place rankings in the last six years as the team’s head coach.

[blackpenredpen]

He is such a great person! I am fortunate enough to know him.

[bacondog]

How can a man who got a 4.3 at CalTech and was a Churchill scholar be so humble and say that other people are brighter than he? He’s really a gift to the mathematics community.

[hongvicodes]

I’m in awe with him saying that talented people makes him optimistic rather than jealous.

[vittoriopiaser]

I hope every maths teacher in the world sees and really understand this.

[BrandedStatusWristwear]

His glasses show he knows he is in a matrix world.

[akhiljalan]

1:17 This is so important. Po-Shen has that long-term vision which ensures he's not just going to train excellent math competition winners, but in fact the next generation of great mathematicians, scientists, engineers...love to see it!

[aviralarpan]

"Maths is distilled heart of thinking "

[ourtube]

He sounds like a great mind and fun mathematics coach. I’m glad he’s not an engineering professor because he’s the type to make you derive every single equation you use on the test lol.

[ipsharoy]

It is the short-tempered and bad math teachers who make students hate maths.

[gelindark]

Oh man, "getting students thinking about how they might come up with an idea on how to solve a problem, as opposed to having students be used to the idea that someone else is gonna show them what to do and than they're just going to copy it."

This is true for ALL of education and I believe Po-Shen just put his finger on the most important thing to change in our approach to teaching.

Cheers from Montreal :)

[volvok]

I hope his views on teaching will permeate the education system and that the next generations will be taught smarter, more practical and more comprehensive forms of math.

[BlueSoulTiger]

An enlightened teacher. We probably disagree about something, but it wasn't here in this clip. Admirable.

[sethgilbertson]

I’m a 4th grade math teacher and this is how I have tried to teach math over the past 4 years. Very rewarding!

[inigoaraluce]

I'm a 3rd year mathematics grad student, what I wouldn't give for him to be my teacher...

[salma-ojrf]

"The man in the class is not an ordinary teacher" so true ...he looks so passionate nd enjoying with what his doing ... am not a math person but he made think different abt it nd wish to give my self a chance to love math...teachers have a big impact on students toward modules and his doing great .
I enjoyed listening to him <3..

[nothingnowhere]

It's honestly amazing. The way this man talks about maths, it as though he's gone beyond doing it and viewing it as an activity, but rather a language of it's own. And he speaks it very fluently. But he says it's more so just a method of pure thinking

[hommies]

There is a book of Paul Lockhart called "Measurement". The book is exactly about what this coach is telling. To not teach to memorice how solve a problem but let people resolve by themselves, less textbook problems, more competition problems!

[bruhnling]

A mathematician's lament. It's a beautiful essay and if you don't like to read there's a video from tibees that discusses it in detail. It so perfectly describes the beauty of math and how catastrophically schools fail to teach it. Of all arts, math is the most underappreciated

[infinitytoinfinitysquaredb]

Who else was wondering how quickly someone could climb the wall behind him?

[robertschlesinger]

Very interesting and worthwhile video. Problem solving courses should be more widespread in American schools. This may help in diminishing the foolishness and conspiracy theories that are taking hold of American society.