Kids still need to learn how to add, subtract, multiply, and so on - BEFORE they pick up the calculators! If we start giving them calculators from age 5 on, they're not doing anything but going through the motions - learning which buttons to push. There's no active construction of mathematical knowledge going on there. We all should know that: I purposely use calculators because it makes my life easier. And I pay for it too - after years of having technology do it for me? I'm a lot slower at simple mathematical operations than I used to be.
Imagine if this was the only way we ever had done math: how would we ever continue to advance mathematical knowledge?
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Lots of those young folks at the cash registers at stores don't know much about math. Fast food places too. This mattered in the old days when we actually had a thing called cash.
ReplyDeleteI hadn't thought about the credit card thing. But yes - another place we just don't practice any more. Maybe some would say b/c of that, we don't need to be able to do, quickly, these computations.
ReplyDeleteBut sometimes I guess I'm a traditionalist.