It’s a scene many families know all too well: the entire household gathered around the table, pencils in hand, staring down at a seemingly impossible math problem.
But for one Ohio family, a normal Sunday morning of tackling homework took a stressful turn, leaving fifth grader Sebastian in tears and his parents, Patrick and Kitty, completely “stumped”.
Patrick, who preferred to use only first names, took to the ‘mildlyinfuriating’ subreddit to share a photo of Sebastian’s math homework, a puzzle called Equato.
The instructions were: “Fill in the empty boxes to make every horizontal and vertical equation correct. Read equations left to right and top to bottom. Use every number in the bank once.”
“We can’t figure out the left-hand column. The second line from the bottom should have a 4 in the first blank. But that doesn’t work. Like, WTH?” Patrick wrote in his post.
The dad of two (Patrick and Kitty also have an eighth grader) said that they had been bracing themselves for this assignment, an eight-page math packet due by Friday.
“Seb was doing great with the first couple of sheets with minimal input from us. He had engaged with it because he likes puzzles and was working independently and really motivated before we hit the Equato,” Patrick told Newsweek.
The fifth grader’s stress became evident through deep breaths and eventually, he began to tear up.
“Before long, we were all huddled around the sheet trying to solve it in various ways—through deductive reasoning and trial and error—but the problem was, none of us were ‘getting it’ and that was adding to Seb’s stress,” Patrick told Newsweek.
Despite his and Kitty’s calm demeanor, the tension grew. “It’s even more stressful when you realize you can’t help aside from offering comfort and encouragement,” Patrick, an editor for two horticultural industry magazines, added.
Their efforts to solve the puzzle, evident from their scribbled calculations on the sheet, were exhaustive. Kitty and Patrick even wrote to their son’s teacher on his worksheet: “Please give us a clue. We’re baffled.”
After running out of solutions, Patrick turned to Reddit for both validation and guidance. “We were feeling mildly infuriated by the situation and just wanted some acknowledgement that math homework can be a pain for all parents and Redditors are smart, and I knew we would either be told there was a mistake in the problem design or get a hint on how to move forward, which we did,” Patrick told Newsweek.
At the time of writing, Patrick’s post has received 18,000 upvotes and 4,700 comments—most of which were “largely positive.”
Many Reddit users sent answers with detailed explanations, helping the family with the confusing problem.
Patrick told Newsweek that they had learned a lot from the Reddit community. “For one thing, while we did try order of operations in our failed attempts, we were thrown by the instructions and how the equations were written. We also forgot that when using order of operations (PEDMAS, etc.) that division and multiplication occur in the order they appear in the equation,” he said.
He also said that the point of the post wasn’t just about obtaining the answers. “We have really appreciated those who have not only sent answers but included how those answers can be arrived at and offered the reasoning behind the process. That’s allowed us to pass that learning on to Sebastian,” Patrick said.
Kitty, who works as an accounts specialist at a small furniture company and a design apprentice at a local garden center on the weekends, added: “I think I’m grateful that this happened. I don’t think any of us will ever forget OOO flexibility moving forward and it was so helpful to hear from MIT grads and the like that the wording was vague and that we were not dumb.”
Some commenters criticized the parents’ struggle, but Patrick remains unfazed. “I think he’ll be okay even though we forgot how the order of operations works one random Sunday in October,” he said.
Sebastian, for his part, has some advice to fellow students: “Remember to keep trying and don’t give up. Asking for help isn’t quitting.”
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