Arithmetic

~ MaryG

What’s the most underrated life skill?

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This article from the Washington Post focuses on better listening, which is an important life skill. But I feel like everyone knows that listening is important. (That doesn’t mean they do it well, but they know they should.) The main tip in the article comes from therapists, but it works for everyone: “If someone is upset, try to listen to what they’re saying and paraphrase it back to them.” It’s called reflective listening.

In terms of underrated skills, I feel like math gets overlooked. And by math, I don’t mean calculus or geometry or even algebra…I mean arithmetic. You know…adding, subtracting, multiplying, dividing and doing percentages in your head. You really shouldn’t need a calculator to figure out what 20% of your bill is in order to tip your hairdresser or server.

For a year or so, I was doing a daily brain-enhancing app that had both language and math exercises, but it wasn’t free and I didn’t renew it. Still, I’m surprised how much of the math stuck with me.

I worked the jewelry table last Saturday at my church’s country fair. Although we had Venmo set up, most people paid cash. I had to figure out lots of sums and then make change for lots of people quickly—all in my head. Honestly, not to brag or anything, but I nailed it 😉. I was just as good as the other lady working with me—and she’s a high school math teacher. I think it was the app.

I need to go find another math (arithmetic) app to keep practicing all the little tricks that make it come fast and easy, when you need it. It’s good “rip off protection” too. You’re harder to scam or take advantage of when you can do arithmetic in your aging head.

This photo is from the jewelry booth at last year’s fair. We had a lot more people this year, including many “hoverers”—women who just couldn’t pry themselves away. My sense was that this was a year to “treat yourself” to some cheap used jewelry because everything else in life is insanely expensive. And we know who to blame for that: 🍊🤡 & his GOP enablers.

If you’re American, for the love of GAWD, make sure you’re registered to vote in the midterms: IWillVote.com

15 thoughts on “Arithmetic”

  1. Math was always my worst subject. First and only C I ever got in high school.
    But I can do tip percentages and count back change, which is more than most young people can do today. You hand them cash and they usually looked puzzled.
    🤣

    Liked by 1 person

  2. My students are so used to using a calculator that they cannot do everyday arithmetic. I think there’s something to be said about learning “times tables” for rote memory. And while most of us are good at hearing other people, there’s a lot of people who don;t know how to actually LISTEN to each other.

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  3. Useful app! It’s so long in between calculations, outside of the hairdresser/restaurant you describe, that I’m definitely not as sharp as I was.

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  4. I’m definitely with you on this one Mary! Cash payments only represent 8-9% of all retail transactions here now. It’s sad.
    My favourite “retail maths” dilemma is when something costs £5.20 for example and you give them a £10 note plus 20p and they start counting out the change 😊

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  5. I’ve heard for years that math isn’t really a necessary skill in practical life. I laugh every time I hear it.

    Maybe most of us aren’t going to spend Tuesday afternoon solving for X, but arithmetic? We use it constantly. Cooking, budgeting, figuring mileage, comparing prices, estimating how much material you need for a project, calculating a tip, making change, or simply recognizing when somebody’s numbers don’t add up.

    The calculator in my pocket is certainly useful, but it doesn’t do much good if I don’t understand what I’m asking it to calculate.

    I think that’s the part we sometimes miss. Practical math isn’t necessarily about being able to work complicated equations in your head. It’s about developing enough understanding of numbers to know when an answer makes sense.

    Technology can do the arithmetic for us.

    It still can’t replace knowing when the arithmetic is wrong.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Yes, exactly! You need to recognize when something is waaay off. If you have no ability to ballpark a number, you end up looking dumb (sorry not sorry) and/or getting ripped off (even worse!) Thanks for commenting 😊

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  6. Great Washington Post article. Thank you for sharing it with us. Active listening is extremely important, and I agree with you about basic math. I sometimes joke with my wife about all the unnecessary college math classes we took when, at the end of the day, all we really needed was basic math.

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    1. Oh good…thanks for letting me know you were able to read the WaPo piece. I thought it was good too.
      I dropped out of Calculus in college because it was interfering with my ability to perform in a musical. And that was it for me and higher math!

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      1. You’re welcome, Mary. It’s good that some newspapers allow subscribers to gift a number of articles each month. I have three gift articles left in The Economist. Yes, calculus, what a waste of time! I took Calculus I, II, and III, and to this day, I haven’t used any of it, not even my wife, who actually works in chemistry.

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  7. Couldn’t agree more! Everyone relies so heavily on phone calculators now that simple mental math really has become a lost art. Kudos to you for crushing it at the fair’s jewelry table—there’s nothing quite like that feeling of calculating change on the spot with a line of people watching!

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