Sunday, January 03, 2010
இ Baŋäŋaz இ
Little Johnny misbehaved, got sent off to his room to complete his homework as a punishment. To make sure he is actually doing his class homework he has to read aloud so that mom can hear him from the kitchen. Reluctantly dragging his feet to his room and within minutes Johnny rattled loudly at the top of his voice "2 + 1 son of a bitch is 3". Loud enough to startle the stunned mom who stormed into Johnny's room immediately. "Johnny don't try to be difficult here and mind your language, did you know what you just said is not proper?" reprimanded his mom. "Why?" Johnny innocently protested,"Ms Brown always says that to us". "What!I want to see your headmaster tomorrow" said the exasperated mom. All errors were corrected at the meeting with the headmaster when Ms Brown said it loud and clear "2 + 1 sum of which is 3". :O) Now that I've caught your attention about creative maths why not continue to read on the rest..
Guess the older folks those days have got their ways and means to educated their children. My mama used to say fish eggs are bad and would impair the ability in arithmetics. Maybe she has her point or maybe she knows it is bad for health but did not know the word is cholesterol. I always have this impression that those who are Chinese educated are better or faster in arithmetics than the Bananaz (English Educated) because they use monosyllabic & disyllabic numbers very often? [This is based on my personal opinion as there is no proven records]. With speed perhaps it might give the Chinese educated a better advantage.
Honestly my mathematics sucks at school and I wonder my mama's input of 'bad' fish eggs truly impaired my calculations or the actual consumption itself attributed to my poor maths. Yeah yeah yeah, blame it on the system, the teacher, the government and everybody except myself because I am not stupid but mentally slow haha. When I do my mental calculations I count better in Hokkien (even though I'm Hakka) and not in English, the flow is smoother and faster. Remembered during one meeting where I sat quite close to a CEO of a public listed company, I could hear him calculating mentally and softly in Mandarin after a power point slide flashed onto the screen which he later posed a question regarding some figures related to the slide in English. So are you aware what dialect or languages that you use when come to mental calculations? Food for thought!
Have been tapping my calculator umpteenth times just to make sure I get this simple maths right but in vain still unable to get the answer and would like to ask for some kind assistance from everyone. Ma & Pa Kettle illustrated on the black board very well and I am beginning to believe them more than I can trust my financial calculator. Check out the video, seeing is believing.
25
-- = 14
5
My last entry I stopped at Blunder #3 and now one of the biggest Blunder which I am not going to forget. Still in my primary school then and I was fortunate my godfather was there to correct me instantly. Cannot really remember the full scenario but the three little ugly words uttered there and then stayed in my head forever. Sit tight and hold on to your chair..
Blunder #4 : I asked a question ~ "WHO IS YOU"?
Posted in: Maths,Video Ma and Pa Kettle
42 Bunchesஇ:
Bananaz, you know the monosyllabie numbers observation was once mentioned by some local educationist sometime ago. It was in the local papers. He made a conclusion thus that Chinese school students are better in Maths because of that.
Funny video. You sure can't beat good ole-fashioned maths. haha.. Thanks for sharing it.
haahahah funny....i am bad in maths too even though i am from chinese edu background hehehee
Parents from the last generation always teaches the right things a wrong way lol :D
Aloha, Numeric Friend!
Comfort Spiral
who is me? i is claire.. so what was your answer.. hehehe.
err, what is that "fish egg" and "YesNoYes"?? i can't catch a ball.. yup, i think using Chinese to count is faster because of the shorter syllabus, at least a lot faster than BM.. haha!! :p
HappySurfer, oh really so the theory hold water that Chinese educated has an advantage. TQ
Manglish, I got first class 'hornets' in Maths, so you don't like figures what about 36-23-36?
Kelvin, cannot help much as old folks were all illiterate, my ma & pa are also the same.
Cloudia, Aloha TQ
reanaclaire, hello you good have eaten full yet? haha..
[SK] 'fish eggs' are eggs of a fish, sorry for the confusion, I have removed the 'YesNoYes' as not to confused people further. We bananaz called the Chinese educated as YesNoYes{是不是 shì bù shì} as explained in my earlier entry in return they called us bananaz 'ang-moh-sai' (caucasian sh*t):p. Thanks for bringing this up.
Ha Ha Ha. Doing mental maths until old age will definitely ensure your brain doesn't loose its usefulness.
Autumn Belle@KDP, many doctors and experts advise the same thing keep the grey matter busy & active like playing mahjong, do gardening etc & best is spent time blogging haha. TQ
I love MATHS. I love playing math games. Unfortunately, my kids do not like MATHS.lol
But somehow, they are good with money.
hugs,
shakira
ShAKirA CHOONG, guess its all up to individual to love their own preferred subject, glad to hear your kids are good with money coz they have good trainers like you.
LOL... i second Shakira. I hate maths, and can't do algebra to save my life, but somehow, I am quite calculative. =D I guess everyone is good at counting money.
Think the lyrics of Wonderful World by Herman Hermits says it all: one and one is two and not son of a bitch is two:p
"Don't know much about geography
Don't know much trigonometry
Don't know much about algebra
Don't know what a slide rule is for
But I know that one and one is two
And if this one could be with you
What a wonderful world this would be"
Never was good in maths:( Luckily, I have some money sense and some common sense too!!
I'm unable to check out the video due to some restrictions on my laptop.
With Excel and the calculator, anyone can do basic Maths arithmetic.
And the best thing is, the basic maths arithmetic (plus, minus, multiple and divide) is already enough to solve more than 95% of our common maths problems.
Cleffairy, Don't need a PHD to count money nowadays 3 year old kid can count better. lol TQ
CheaHS@n, love Peter Noone & Herman's Hermits.TQ
Keats, Great to have the two good $en$e$. TQ
Shingo T, Aiya you missed the fun in the video pld do try again don't miss it. Thanks for the tips on Excel.
I is the witch! LOL
I loved maths at school, I think I used English to calculate when I was in uni but now I think I'm calculating using Cantonese in my head. :)
I "is" the paiseh now that the 'is' spreads around, its OK with me with a mistake I remember for life as not to repeat it. Your Cantonese dialect must be very fluent then.
I remember my mom also disallowed me to eat fish roe, and the same reason was given. Funny old Chinese mindset...
Happy New Year!
Ha ha ha, I don't eat fish eggs but still not good in maths....LOL!
jam, great grandma's words of wisdom passed down through the generations or maybe there is a little bit of truth haha.
Pete, oh you prove the old folks wrong but then you are a financial consultant must be very good in maths, just being humble bro.
I wasn't a math whiz either. I found my talent with the camera.....finally! After so many years.
It makes me wonder how come Chinese and English educated people are so different.
Chinese educated might be good at one thing. But I have to say they are very "square". They don't ask questions and just accept whatever the teachers say. Sound familiar? I almost can guarantee that for certain things, they think alike, almost like they come out of the same square mould! (Is that good or bad?)
I hope I am not biased as I was in Chinese medium too in my Primary years.
I have to say, the person who thinks of this video is very clever! Is it originated from the US?
you are hakka? i am hakka too, though i can't speak them well. as for mental calculation, i use chinese since i had been speaking it since born. so in the end, my dialect? chinese. :p
Mei Teng, you're just into camera not too long? Well you are fast you have picked up excellent photography skills. TQ
Ai Shiang, very familiar haha, many people thought I'm Chinese educated coz I was timid and have that 'square' look maybe. I presume those days they were taught that way not to question the authority of the seniors/teachers and what they say, no questions asked?. Think nowadays it could be different from those days. TQ
Ai Shiang, video is most likely from US, fyi I fell in the same trap during primary days, just can't figure out where to place the figure, real bad then. Blame it on the fish eggs haha.TQ
Levian, same like my friend who speaks good Hakka dialect but used Mandarin for all calculations. It would be tongue twisting. TQ
foongpc, I is a laughing stock now dunno where to hide, gotta need to dig a hole to bury the skins. haha. TQ
hohoho lmao the video... btw i use cantonese to do the mental calculation though i am a hokkien... because i used to help my parents selling veggie at pasar... you know lah... need to do the calculation quick once i put the veggie on the scales....
Hi fufu, yeah the video truly turn Maths upside down. Oh using Canto for mental calculation as most Chinese ed would use Mandarin. Have a great weekend.
Awesome Math Post.
Keep it up!
Hi Jingle, Thanks for dropping by love your pinky entry.
Maths was my least fave subject in school. for some reason, i can't play the video.
btw, thanks for dropping by today.
Happy weekend.
I'm not good in Maths too. I even hate it during my school days. :P
I'm crap in maths. Trying very hard to get son be good in them though.
life ramblings, seems like most bloggers don't fancy maths, can't play video? Not sure what happened, maybe try again later.
EastCoastLife, thanks for dropping by, strong word 'hate' maths.
lina, so mama gave up on Maths but get son to excel haha. Thanks for dropping by, btw how's your 10 credit cards potong-ing getting by?
haha, now i understood why 25/5 is 14!
wenn, for once I thought so and beginning to doubt my calculator haha
so far only potong 2 cards. Heh heh
Very sayang all my cards woorrrr... Some more the banks give incentive to keep the card. I wait and see lah.
Mommy so horribly bad in Maths (I once got only 7% for my "kebarangkalian" test, had to ketuk ketampi in front of class, no choice had to drill my son to become cleverer than me lah. Huhu
hi friend, thanks for your email and your kind comments on my blogs. I now know how to leave a comment lol, this is an interesting blog, Maths was never my top subject but I get by, good post..:)
lina, hope for the best and prepare for the worst. Keeping fingers cross gomen gonna relax the rules but looks like they are desperately in need of funds. Mom not in maths so get the young to count for you. haha TQ
William Manson © , sorry for the initial confusion on the comments column, great you get along well with maths. TQ
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