Avogadro and aids to education

[Vagabond]

Those who don't have an internal lookup table might be more inclined to solve as (7*10) - 7.

 

 

And how did you "know" what 7*10 was in the first place ?

 

Wasn't the "ten times table" one of the very first pieces of rote learning you experienced at infants' school ?

 

Interestingly, subtraction is something I remember learning by experiment . An Ex Indian-Army colonel and a bag of marbles provided that before I reached school age.

[Steve Walker]

Good question - I'm not sure whether I knew the table or the "append a zero" algorithm first.

 

I believe arithmetic for kids now covers a lot more "how to calculate" than memorisation of tables. Which is slower for 8x7, but provides for 16x17. Ideally, one would have both!

[corydoras]

And how did you "know" what 7*10 was in the first place ?

 

Wasn't the "ten times table" one of the very first pieces of rote learning you experienced at infants' school ?

 

Interestingly, subtraction is something I remember learning by experiment . An Ex Indian-Army colonel and a bag of marbles provided that before I reached school age.

To multiply any number by 10 add a zero on the end. The first table I learned was the 2 times.

 

I never went to "infant school". I went to a Primary School in the countryside. There were about thirty-five pupils. The youngest was my wee brother who was about 4 and a half and the oldest were about 11, next stop secondary school. There was only one teacher, all the kids were in the same room, youngest at the front, oldest at the back.

 

I remember in the winter time we had a big pot-belly stove to warm the place up.

[Phone]

All,

 

I'm "out of bounds" here without some research (forgetfulness). I am, and always was horrible at math. However if it was posed as a "word" problem I had no trouble - (John had two apples and gave one to Jane. How many apples does John have left)

 

isn't there more than one kind of memory - i.e. duel memory?

 

I am/was often considered "clever" and a troublemaker (much like Vagabond described). However, I cannot do ONE line of a crossword puzzle. As soon as the answer I've contrived doesn't fit - I'm done. Now by choice but there was a time I tried truly hard to "figure out" crossword puzzles. I guess I simply cannot.

 

Phone

 

Phone

[John S]

All,

 

I'm "out of bounds" here without some research (forgetfulness). I am, and always was horrible at math. However if it was posed as a "word" problem I had no trouble - (John had two apples and gave one to Jane. How many apples does John have left)

 

That's easy. John still has two apples and Jane is up the duff.

[corydoras]

That's easy. John still has two apples and Jane is up the duff.

:bigemo_harabe_net-163:

[Vagabond]

Interesting that, Phone, as Norma and I do the Times Jumbo crossword (It's only set on Saturdays, so we only buy one newspaper a week)

 

I set the crosswords for the quarterly Journal "Waterlog" I sometimes do a soduku occasionally, just to show that I can, (Saturday Times offers various levels, I usually choose the one marked "fiendish"). I also while away transcontinental flights by tackling the on-board computer at chess (the programs aren't much good)

 

I do all this to keep the brain active for as late in life as possible. I believe in "Use it or lose it" I just hope that is right and I am not wearing my brain out prematurely !!

 

At various stages of my career I had to

 

A/ Answer degree-level questions (as a student)

 

B/ Mark answers to degree-level questions (as a tutor)

 

C/ Set degree-level questions (as an examiner)

 

B was more challenging than A, and C was much more challenging than A and B put together !

 

Experience B made me very wary of so-called "qualifications" as so many students would cobble together enough half-remembered snippets to generate a bare pass mark, and then sum-up in their final paragraph with a statement which demonstrated quite clearly that they really hadn't grasped the concept at all !

 

Part of that scenario was often down to a poorly set question, and an unimaginative marking structure. When I came to set such questions myself © I found setting good questions much more challenging than either answering or marking them.