Are you good at Mental Math?
- Thread starter Thirdgen89GTA
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I use calculator apps for due diligence when figuring customers' costs but I can do most easy math in my head. I was in a class Tuesday where I'm a team leader. My 2nd in command guy was asked to figure out a math question on his calculator and I wrote down the answer faster than he did doing it in my head. Not senile yet. :smile:
i led the math team to the first win in decades in hs on this team 100 question math test and i was a top dork for math questions on academic team as well. i used to be able to do some cool stuff in my head (although not to the point of these speed tricks and knowing all the math tricks this guy is doing.)
now my brain sucks for this stuff. no exercise, no skillz, lazy brain
i had an informal math rivalry with this guy isaac from grayslake who i think had a bit of a stutter. we were on the same floor fresh year at uiuc but even then we never talked, even though our roomates actually did a few times... to this day i don't know if one of us was better than the other, i know he won the individual math competition '20 question test' though. i did not take it during the competition. our valedictorian took it and got 6 right. i got 12 but took it in class and not the competition. to this day i still want to know what isaac got. i'd score a 0 today for sure though.
now my brain sucks for this stuff. no exercise, no skillz, lazy brain
i had an informal math rivalry with this guy isaac from grayslake who i think had a bit of a stutter. we were on the same floor fresh year at uiuc but even then we never talked, even though our roomates actually did a few times... to this day i don't know if one of us was better than the other, i know he won the individual math competition '20 question test' though. i did not take it during the competition. our valedictorian took it and got 6 right. i got 12 but took it in class and not the competition. to this day i still want to know what isaac got. i'd score a 0 today for sure though.
Mental math is nothing more than finding number patterns. I have been using common core math in my head since before it was a thing. I didnt know it was common core until my kids started coming home with common core math homework. Then I realized I was doing this same method in my head since highschool. And to my wife, common core is like trying to read another language that she just cant understand.
One thing I learned in college was from a class called human logic. It was a class that was made to teach you how to identify and understand how you are wired to learn. It was eye opening. Im not sure why we dont do this freshman year of highschool, not college. That class tought me that I was a visual learner and needed to see the material written out. I was able to remember what I saw and basically read from those visuals what I was able to remember. I used to doodle on my notes various shapes. Then I would remember all the notes I took because I could visualize that paper I had written them on, and remembering the shape or doodle on that paper helped even more. Sounds weird or very complicated? But its my nature. Some people need to hear things to remember them.
Getting back to this mental math subject. Math is easy if you find the patterns. Then you need to remember the patterns in the way you learn. I was lucky enough to find my way, and its been great to remember things.
One thing I learned in college was from a class called human logic. It was a class that was made to teach you how to identify and understand how you are wired to learn. It was eye opening. Im not sure why we dont do this freshman year of highschool, not college. That class tought me that I was a visual learner and needed to see the material written out. I was able to remember what I saw and basically read from those visuals what I was able to remember. I used to doodle on my notes various shapes. Then I would remember all the notes I took because I could visualize that paper I had written them on, and remembering the shape or doodle on that paper helped even more. Sounds weird or very complicated? But its my nature. Some people need to hear things to remember them.
Getting back to this mental math subject. Math is easy if you find the patterns. Then you need to remember the patterns in the way you learn. I was lucky enough to find my way, and its been great to remember things.
egfuckingzactly how i feel.
i cringe when i read people on fb or wherever playing down common core.
Interesting, i'll have to read up on this. I've always been pretty quick at mental math and I've gotten faster thanks to my current job, but I never focused on how I get to the numbers
Yeah, pretty much the same here. I used to be pretty decent at stuff like that. It's a matter of practice at a lot of levels. Back when I was doing a lot of engineering work I could do it quickly.
To that end, if I'm thinking about something (say an electronics or car project) while I'm not able to use a calculator I'm still a fan of what I call "hack math." Basically a rough set of calculations that can be used to determine if something's in the ball park and should be investigated further. Since a lot of electronic components deal in discreet values you can end up with an "over/under" that will get a component value in the ball park.
Math for the sake of mathing though? not about it really.
Smokinhot
3-man rules!!!!
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