This rule, agreed on by almost every teacher of short-cut mathematics, is to work from left to right - not right to left.
This is just opposite to what is taught in school. We are taught to add, subtract, and multiply from right to left. It is easier to teach to children and easier to learn from the "imitation" standpoint of learning by rote, but it is directly contrary to the way we read and think about numbers.
There are at least three important advantages to working from left to right.
First, it is the way we look at everything else on a page. We read from left to right.
Second, it is the way we look at a number right up to the moment we begin doing something to it. For instance, look at the number 164,928. You read it one-hundred sixty-four thousand, nine-hundred and twenty-eight. But when you begin to add or subtract or multiply it, you are taught to tackle it as 8, 2, 9, 4, 6, 1.
It isn't the same number at all. At the very outset we are taught to combine this number with another in a totally foreign, unrecognizable form.
There is still a third reason why it is faster and better to work from left to right. You develop your most important numbers first and work toward the "details."
Suppose you are a salesman who has just sold a $423 order for which you will get a 6% commission. If you work from left to right you know by the time you get just one digit that your commission will be twenty-something dollars. You know when you have finished two digits that your commission is $25 and change.
But if you work in the schoolroom, right-to-left way, the first two digits you develop tell you only the change. You know only that you will get something dollars and 38 cents. Not until you finish working out the whole commission do you know that your commission will be $25.38.
This is true of every number and every application, whether or not a decimal point happens to break it into dollars and cents. The first digit in a number is ten times as important as the second, a hundred times as important as the third, and so on down the line.
Working from left to right reveals to you, step by step, the most important numbers first. For this reason alone, the new methods for doing this are one of the most valuable quick estimating tools you can have.
The fact that each digit in a number decreases in importance by a factor of ten as it moves one place to the right is the reason why many companies today report their operations and financial position in "round" numbers: rounding off the pennies or, in very large companies, tens, hundreds, and even thousands of dollars. It is the number to the left that is most important.
Even the U. S. government now permits each of us to figure our income tax in round numbers, to the nearest dollar for each deduction and part of the calculation. If your income-tax report is at all complicated and you do it yourself and have not tried rounding it off, you will be astonished next time you do it. It saves close to half the time of doing the report.
The point to be made here is simply this: work at it. It is, as you learn to use it, as black-and-white a difference as thinking of the number 462 or approaching it as 2, 6, 4.
First Grade Math Skills
Even I haven’t. But what if such a thing really exists. Wouldn’t that be great for both the sports and math world ? Our would-be sports champs be then able to concentrate on their game better and stop worrying about their upcoming Math paper. Unfortunately, for now such a product is not available at your local drug store ( or for that matter anywhere else ).
But thankfully there is an easier way making the deadly duo of sports and math a reality.
Sports and Math.
Why is it so rare to find a tag team of sports and math ? It is common to find many talented soccer and basketball players, swimmers, athletes and other sports men struggling with Math. As it is the Math problems are plaguing the students of all grades, age and aptitude but the math problems of the sports man are particularly severe. That is because sports man hardly gets time in between his rigorous training sessions to study math and whenever he does, then also the textbook appears to be written in Chinese.
Sport skills Vs Math skills.
Does muscular flexibility come at the cost of mental ability ? Working as a Math tutor I have been teaching Math to state level soccer players, swimmers, athletes and even to amateur boxers ( thank God I teach math online ). I have found that many of them have weak basic math skills but almost all of them have high analytical ability ( the most important raw material to learn math). It has now been even scientifically proved that sportsman’s brain has a greater ability to form synaptic pathways ( temporary circuits ) that lead to faster analysis of the problem. Understandably so, as their brain is trained to make split second decisions in the nick of time. In this regard sports is math.
Ideal teacher to help tackle both sports and math.
The top shoe companies like Nike and Adidas make specially designed shoes and apparels for their star athletes to dramatically enhance his performance. Similarly a sports man requires a Math teacher who can custom design a Math lesson for his specific needs. This will not only help the sports man do well in his math paper but also help become a better sportsman as he will have sports math skills (i.e grasp over math in sport like batting average, bowling economy rate, free throw conversion percentage etc).
This is how a math lesson should be made for a sportsman.
1.Keep the Math lesson like a 100 meter dash : Sportspersons find it difficult to sit down still and concentrate for long hours ( I am not talking about the chess players ). They become restless soon. But the level of concentration they can generate in spurts is amazing. So Math tutor should make sure that Math lesson is kept short yet power packed.
2.Build his Basic math skills first : Before you can teach a person how to hit a home run, you must teach him how to grip the bat. Even born world champs need to get their basics right. So begin from the very beginning. Once the sportsman is taught the right way of solving math problems, he starts picking up the rest of math pretty fast. Always remember that the mind of a sportsperson is trained to repeat an action to perfection.
3.Stop being his teacher, start being his trainer : Stop preaching a sports man theories of Math. Tell him straightway the action he needs to do in order to get to the answer. I call this the one jab knockout technique. This way you make the sportsperson play at his strength.
This way a sports man can pick up both sports and math skills with the same ease with which he gulps down a protein shake ( provided it is not that awful in taste ).
Both Jimmy Cox & are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
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