Shape: The Hidden Geometry of Information, Biology, Strategy, Democracy, and EverythingElse

by Jordan Ellenberg

There’s no intellectual vantage from which you can’t easily sight a zone of ignorance, and that’s where your eyes should be pointed, if you want to learn. If math class is easy, you’re doing it wrong.

“education must be chiefly self-education, during or after school, or it will never approach completion at all.”

Our job as teachers is, yes, to explain—but our job is just as much a species of marketing. We have to sell students on the idea that it’s worth it to spend the time outside of class it takes to truly learn this stuff.