What did you learn today?

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ChicagoBlue2 said:
In my opinion, it should still be.
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In my professional opinion, I concur with you because most simple arithmetic can be done in the head more quickly than the time needed to get out a calculator, press a bunch of keys, and read the output on the display. Kids should be taught how to do mental math, especially with the fact that standardized tests are getting longer and harder.

Also, when kids use calculators without using mental math, they might press some keys and trust what the calculator says and believe it is the right answer without confirming it by hand. This tends to be a problem when there are parentheses mentioned on the worksheet.
 
I can do simple calculations on my head but if nit i need paper. I cant keep the big number in my head. Not to be making your opinion less. But what makes you a professional on this field? I agree with you idea of teaching kids mental math either way.
 
I refused let my son have calculator until he was twelve he then became two years ahead of others in his year
It sad kids unable to do basic tables fractions ratio's...good grounding in mental arithmetic and harder stuff follows with little problem
 
Dreamer03 said:
I can do simple calculations on my head but if nit i need paper. I cant keep the big number in my head. Not to be making your opinion less. But what makes you a professional on this field? I agree with you idea of teaching kids mental math either way.
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Well, if you can't handle computations that involve big numbers, then do it on paper. Once you are done solving the problem on paper, verify the answer with a calculator.

I make myself a professional in this field because I have a degree in Mathematics and I had worked on a doctorate in Mathematics Education in which I did research on these stuff.

caz12 said:
I refused let my son have calculator until he was twelve he then became two years ahead of others in his year
It sad kids unable to do basic tables fractions ratio's...good grounding in mental arithmetic and harder stuff follows with little problem
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I hope you are feeling better. I wouldn't let my future children use a calculator and I'd use flash cards to help them develop and reinforce their mental math skills. :)
 
I didn't have a calculator until I was in my 20's. I never used one in school (I did have a slide rule for that).

Even when I worked as a cashier, I had nothing electronic to work with. I had a plastic tray with dividers for the cash denominations and coins, and a piece of paper and pencil for large orders. I did the math in my head, adding up product costs, including calculating sales tax, then figuring the change. I was never over or under at the end of the shift. We also counted inventory by hand.

I often total my purchases in my head when I'm shopping. It was convenient when I paid by cash to have the amount ready in hand when I checked out.

Poor kids today. :(
 
Ok cool. I guess you can say in your professional opinion then. Ill probably teach special ed kids math. I dont let my sister use calculator. But i know she does use it in school. And they do t teach cursive here anymore but they are expected to know it
 
MangaReader said:
I hear that the schools aren't teaching cursive anymore either.
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True that.

A legislator in our state is trying to get cursive writing and multiplication tables back into public classrooms.
 
Dreamer03 said:
Ok cool. I guess you can say in your professional opinion then. Ill probably teach apexial ed kids math.
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It's not just those who experienced it-- we strongly believe that kids need to learn the necessary skills we did, but today's schools are way too lax than they were back then, and kids aren't learning things mentally like they should be. For example, I used to have a class competition to see who could answer flash cards the quickest, and the person who answered correctly moved onto the next person. Those were fun.
 
MangaReader said:
I hear that the schools aren't teaching cursive anymore either.
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Yeah, that's true! I remember in my youth my mother would make me sit down and do cursive workbooks. Ugh!

Reba said:
I didn't have a calculator until I was in my 20's. I never used one in school (I did have a slide rule for that).

Even when I worked as a cashier, I had nothing electronic to work with. I had a plastic tray with dividers for the cash denominations and coins, and a piece of paper and pencil for large orders. I did the math in my head, adding up product costs, including calculating sales tax, then figuring the change. I was never over or under at the end of the shift. We also counted inventory by hand.

I often total my purchases in my head when I'm shopping. It was convenient when I paid by cash to have the amount ready in hand when I checked out.

Poor kids today. :(
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Yeah, poor kids! Even kids in other countries like Japan and China, they don't use calculators as they mainly use mental math or do math on paper. There are students who even use an abacus!
 
I am old enough that we were required to memorize multiplication tables but I did not get as fast as many because the year we did the most of it I missed a good deal with illness. Then as an adult I became what those of us that used adding machines as part of our jobs called an "adding machine cripple". In my case it was a matter of using the adding machine and then leaving tapes to keep track of which accounts had been balanced (such as Accounts Receivable in the general ledger and the individual subsidiary accounts) so that you did not redo ones that had already been done or skip any.
 
respectyoda said:
Well, if you can't handle computations that involve big numbers, then do it on paper. Once you are done solving the problem on paper, verify the answer with a calculator.

I make myself a professional in this field because I have a degree in Mathematics and I had worked on a doctorate in Mathematics Education in which I did research on these stuff.



I hope you are feeling better. I wouldn't let my future children use a calculator and I'd use flash cards to help them develop and reinforce their mental math skills. :)
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I used flash cards aswel....I made maths a game when they were little that helped....I would refused him calculator at secondary school but they went straight into co signs etc and logs are not done with log tables anymore
Age of twelve with good grounding beforehand then the calculator is good but not before
Thanks feel bit better
 
Neither of my kids had to learn cursive in school. They both had to learn the multiplication table. Son can still so it, daughter cannot. Daughter also cannot do any math involving double digit numbers. She has dyscalculia.
www.aboutdyscalculia.org
 
math sucks. learned about quadratic inequalities, how to solve them both graphically and symbolically.. blah. still 2 more sections to get through for today. ew.
 
Reba said:
I didn't have a calculator until I was in my 20's. I never used one in school (I did have a slide rule for that).

Even when I worked as a cashier, I had nothing electronic to work with. I had a plastic tray with dividers for the cash denominations and coins, and a piece of paper and pencil for large orders. I did the math in my head, adding up product costs, including calculating sales tax, then figuring the change. I was never over or under at the end of the shift. We also counted inventory by hand.

I often total my purchases in my head when I'm shopping. It was convenient when I paid by cash to have the amount ready in hand when I checked out.

Poor kids today. :(
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When I go food shopping, I need to have the ability to keep track of how much I am paying for, and that requires mental adding, so I know where I stand, and stay within my budget. I have never gone over, because I carefully watch how much I am adding.
 
respectyoda said:
Yeah, that's true! I remember in my youth my mother would make me sit down and do cursive workbooks. Ugh!
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My cursive writing is self taught (which explains a lot). :lol:

In one of our numerous moves across the country, I transferred mid school year from one school that was still printing to another that had already learned cursive. The teacher didn't have time to teach me, so she gave me the workbook to take home and teach myself. It really wasn't that hard and kinda fun.
 
Memorizing the multiplication table is good, but I also made sure my girls learned how to do multiplications.


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School was never my strong point. I remember in 7th grade the teacher called me to his desk and gave me a stack of apprenticeship for the construction trades options. He told me he thought I would be a really good pipefitter. True story. He was really serious, concerned for me. I thanked him and took the papers home. Turned out he was close to right, I ended up being an electrician. I just spotted his obituary the other day in the city paper and the memory came back.
 
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