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I always had trouble handling numbers. It began with the multiplication table. We were forced to memorise the multiplication table. The teacher would ask us to stand up and recite the multiplication table as if it were a poem. How sick a concept.
The next set of major troubles started with the decimal numbers. It was quite an exercise to multiply them. Then came the statistics with lots and lots of number crunching and huge formulae to learn. All of this was done using pen and paper without a calculator.
How relevant is number crunching skills in the days of calculators and super computers. ?
My grand mother had only very little education. But she could do quite a lot of complicated money calculations in her head, stuff that was useful to her in her daily life. Those skills helped her to live without a calculator.
My dad is a mathematics professor. But he doesn’t have the skills of his mother. He needs a pen and paper to do calculations. But he has an Mphil degree that my grand mother didn’t have. I have a B-tech degree and I don’t have the skills of my dad. I need a calculator. I hate using pen and paper for doing calculations. During my high school days, I used to write small C programs to cross check my statistics pen and paper calculations.
I am of the opinion that calculators and computers should be introduced early into the school. As long as the student understands what is happening when he multiplies 2 numbers, then the process of finding that answer is irrelevant. We all know how to use the shift and add mechanism to multiply. But how many of us truly understands how it works ? I know you are thinking… keep thinking.
One counter argument that I used to hear from my friends or people whom I discuss this with is that, the number crunching develops the brain. But scientists say intelligence is not something that can be developed. It has to be there when you are born. But you may develop some skills by practising. But are those skills relevant ?
Mathematics is something beyond number crunching and statistics. But our education system creates a really bad impression about mathematics by forcing the multiplication table and other irrelevant stuff down the child’s throat.
Its like the cat who fell into hot water. Once you are scared of something or had a bad experience with something, its very difficult to get it terms with it.
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Review on — June 11, 2008, 9:12 am