[jambutty]

Good for your 6 years old daughter Gayle. You can never be too young to learn multiplication tables although she will only need to go as far as the 10 times table as decimal is all the rage now.

We got marks for getting the right answer to a sum too Gayle but we got more marks if we showed how it were done but it had to be right first.

If you had been around in the forties and fifties you would have marvelled at the shopkeepers as they totted up a list of prices in old money and look what they had to contend with.

However the world progresses and machines help us in our lives so there is no reason why they shouldn’t be used. But what happens when the shop assistant punches a wrong amount? It is unlikely that the mistake would be spotted from the final total. So we have bar codes to take care of that problem but there are many shops that are not large enough to use barcodes and the price of each item bought is punched in individually. Machines do not make mistakes – people do and if a mistake is made would anyone know if their arithmetical skills are severely limited?

I use a calculator for large numbers but if I do hit a wrong key I know from looking at the result that something is wrong.

We would all like the right change jaysay but do we know what it is supposed to be before it is handed over. Of course we do, well many of us, because we can subtract the amount asked for from the amount handed over, in our heads. But only because we learned arithmetic to a competent standard.

Two of the three parts of maths - geometry (which includes trigonometry) and algebra - are more for future engineers/scientists etc than the average person but still come in handy in later life. I have used them although not very often.

Sadly it is the education system that is primarily at fault. Firstly pupils spend 5 hours less per week in lessons than they used to and secondly many teachers do not teach but hope that the pupils will learn what is being shown to them. Then there is the disruptive element that is more prevalent today than yesterday.

Algebra and trig might be needless rubbish to you lettie but without it you wouldn’t be able to post your views on this forum. The inventors, engineers, designers and scientists that made the computer and Internet possible couldn’t have done so without the full range of maths. However you grasped the most important everyday subject – arithmetic - as your prowess in the chip shop clearly demonstrated. Had you learned your arithmetic using the old money I have no doubt that you could have handled that equally well.