Education Why Asian cultures seem so much better at maths, incredible!

I listened to a radio 4 program today about why Asian cultures seem so much better at maths and numbers than many western countries, it was quite amazing the numeracy skills that many very young children have and it's all done using an abacus at lightning speed and even more staggering is the method they use for calculation with an imaginary abacus

They have big competitions to see who can add up 15 numbers in the quickest time, 15 numbers are flashed up on a screen and they have to add them up the record is 15 numbers in 1.7 seconds!

You can listen to the BBC4 broadcast on the iplayer here. and here is a video on the subject.



Could the western world teach better maths skills to their children if they threw away calculators and used the abacus or would we just end up with lots of people that couldn't use an abacus

 

Western children have fat, turkey twizzler fuelled fingers that would make a pigs ear of an abacus

Calculators have big, easy buttons that are harder to miss.

 

Nevermind being able to use one or not, from my school years, most kids now just can't be arsed at all at maths, or science, or anything.

 

I work as IT support in a school, so may not be as qualified as one of the teachers to voice my opinion.

However, (as a generalisation) it would seem that students are becoming increasingly dependent on software and the Internet to do their work for them. Spelling and grammar checks, inbuilt calculators, Google Translate and Wikipedia would appear to be par for the course.

I have voiced my concern and have asked if the school should support a more 'back to basics' approach promoting pen and paper teaching, but I don't think that's going anywhere.

Computers do have their place, but should be support tools rather than something that allows students to Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V though secondary school.

 

Skill at the Soroban does not equate to skill at mathematics, it just means you can add up numbers very quickly. You might as well say proficient musicians are good at maths because they have all those notes with distinct mathematical relationships and patterns.

That said, I think it's quite a good thing to teach as it's engaging and helps with visualising how our number system is set up.

 

I don't think being good at adding up automatically translates into being good at maths, but we have have to learn about other subjects as well, such as music, art and drama which are in my opinion a complete waste of time.

 

At school, the only stuff we do on calculators is algebra, and even then, it still just has its place rather than one's brain.
The last time I remember having an abacus, I was about 5 and I loved the damn thing!

 

There was a bit about this in freakonomics (I think or something similar I read) and they said there were two big factors firstly all the numbers are one syllable and also the fact that the numbering goes one to ten then eleven is pronounced ten one twelve is ten two etc then twenty is two ten , twenty one is two ten one etc etc

Having a 5 year old in year one at the moment I can understand how the english names for numbers can be confusing, 14 sounds like 40 etc.

 

Those "useless" subjects of music, art and drama not only cover huge swathes of regular teaching (music is all math, drama for English, history and social sciences, art for philosophy, geometry, calculus and trigonometry [golden mean and such,] history, the list goes on) but often do it better than the teaching we have now.

I would like to see a return to the "classical" education, where people walked out of school with enough of a grip on everything to do something, but they also walked out with tools to deal with each other. I was one of the last to have philosophy as a subject in high school. I think they replaced it with another semester of economics now, but their economics is all theory, no concrete application-which is also the issue with everything else we teach. With no real world application, there is no reason to worry about it-they're never going to use it, according to them.

 

Kids do better at maths in a culture that values teaching and academic excellence shock!

 

A nerd forum that thinks maths teaching should be better and other subjects are a waste who'd have funk it.

You need to be able to try everything to decide what you enjoy and would like to do.

So they can add up fast big deal that's going to come in handy when you fit me a new gas boiler chump.

 

As England is now largely a service orientated country I think we will be the ones fitting your boiler and those with the math skills will be the ones designing and building it

 

Depends what sector of maths I suppose. Just because I can put 2 and 2 together, it doesn't mean I can put boiler and house together.

 

If anything it shows the immense focus and obsession of asian culture. Which can be very useful if pointed in the right direction. Being able to run through a series of mechanical operations quickly is only so useful. Applying maths requires a more abstract level of thought.

 

Honestly Ive gained nothing from those subjects. My art teacher pretty much refused to teach me because Im crap (I really am), and music was pointless because as someone who learned an instrument, it was easy yet to everyone else it was boring because mostly they'd decided music wasn't' for them.

By the way, I should clarify, I don't think the subjects themselves are useless, just teaching people who have no interest them is pointless.

 

Exactly, That's a big part of the finding of the radio program it's not so much what they are doing but how are they doing it, Alex Bellos the radio presenter who went to Japan has a degree in mathematics and he was completely baffled as to their ability to recognize 15 numbers flashed onto a screen in 1.7 seconds and to add them up, their brains are processing the information in a way that we do not understand.

If this level of processing information can be applied to other things and why couldn't it with training it might open up new ways of learning.

 

Mentats. ****ing Mentats.

Where's my spice?

 

I'm waiting to see the "Social Media" classes start up, with lame ar*e attempts to incorporate statistics in the subject.

 

I am really hot when it comes to math this is due to my aspergers traits...

 

Yes, and that is why we have so many people who finished art/history/law/other humanist stuff universities working at McDonalds. Because they learned what they enjoy, but there is no need for tens of thousands archelogists or art experts every year. Sure, there is place for some of them, but not in numbers the schools produce them.