BECK SEWART, 16

Dear Mr Brown or, as I know you, ‘TLMaths’, You don’t know me at all. I am not one of your students, or a dedicated watcher of your channel, or even a lone unread commenter on one of your many videos. I may be responsible for the addition of several days to the total watch time on your channel. However, I doubt that in these unprecedented times that this would be the biggest thing on your mind. But I feel like I know you very well. I have watched the way your classroom has changed, as posters came up and down and your whiteboard circled from dirty to clean and vice versa. I feel that I have enjoyed the full range of your Math Pun T-shirts, and I have been the victim of your unpausing but short lectures, hundreds of times. Looking at the numbers, it would appear that I have. Me and my closest friend found ourselves in the same situation as many back in March. Facing fve months free from any responsibilities, but unable to do anything with that freedom. So we found solace by sitting down every morning in front of a webcam, pen and paper in hand, ready to conquer a year’s worth of knowledge with nothing but reckless abandonment.

Surprisingly, we succeeded.

Your A-level Maths playlist is 1005 videos long. 499 of those cover the AS syllabus, making for 46 hours 51 minutes and 3 seconds of content to work through. Don’t worry, I didn’t count them: coding is the other love in my life. Of those 499 videos, we watched a surprising number. My notes could probably fll a textbook, though my actual revision of the concepts… Well, some things I should leave for next year. But we watched them.

We spent more time with you this lockdown than any of our teachers, our other friends, or even any other YouTuber. We ooohed every time we saw a video with your new intro. Groaned every time you covered something we were sure we knew, and then fell out of our seats when you showed us a new way to do it. I still remember (only a few months ago, can you believe?) when you reinvented proving a prime number, and we had to pause the video in amazement. Everything suddenly seemed so simple. Tis lockdown was not simple. My sleep schedule broke, and I have no idea how I’m going to be able to keep up with the slog of A-levels afer 5 months of nothing of the sort. But you were the one constant in all this. 10:30, every weekday.

Tank you. (a fan)