Some people believe that calculators have eliminated the need to learn the skills to perform mathematical ope?

Question

Some people believe that calculators have eliminated the need to learn the skills to perform mathematical operations by hand. State your position on this belief, and then support your position with real-life stories or examples.

Answer 1

I'm sorry but if people can't do simple math (adding, subtracting, dividing and multiplication) without calculators then our society is in sad shape

I had a friend that wanted some help on college level math homework for an algebra class. This person was told to reduce some fraction. Out came the calculator. I said "you can't do it on there, you need to do it on the paper like the instructions say" she said "I don't know how"

Personally, I think that the MAJORITY of the problem lies within the students and their lack to learn. Not only in math but in all subjects. Some people blame ADD, others blame no child left behind. I blame the people themselves. ADD is a cop out excuse for an under-achievers ability to perform. I blame the parents for not being more involved in their child's education, not the educators that teach the curriculum.

Answer 2

This is true, it has. The result is that far too many pupils no longer have any "feel" for arithmetic calculations: they have absolutely no idea at all what the answer should be, and even for the simplest of calculations, and rely totally on their calculator. It would be Luddite to say that calculators should be banned entirely from schools, because in the higher reaches of maths, they do save a lot of time in doing fairly complicated and repetitive calculations. Personally, I would like to see their use in schools only past the age of 15. You asked for a real life example: I had set some simple arithmetic sums for a particularly slow class of 14 year olds, and was marking their work. One girl, out first with her book, had got every one wrong. When I pointed out to her that they were not presented in the way that I wanted, and they were all wrong, her response was: "They`re not ! I did them all on my calculator" That sort of sums it all up, I think !

Answer 3

You need to understand the mathematics involved before you can tell the calculator what to do. That's like saying the computer will eliminate the need to learn to write.
There are, when you get right down to it, only two basic functions:addition/subtractions and multiplication/divisions (each is the reciprocal of the other) but before you can plunge into the number work, you need to know how to set up a problem - how to formulate an equation, how to rationalize a word problem into mathematics. So, while the calculator might interfere with the proficiency of your math skills, it won't elimate them.

Answer 4

While calculators are great help on figuring out problems you had better know how it came up with that answer if you are in college. You can use that calculator on your home work but when it comes time to take a test you are not allowed to use them so you had better know how to get the answer and show your work or you'll fail your math classes. So if you learn by just using pencil and paper you'll be better off if you want to understand what you are doing and how to get the correct answer.

Answer 5

Calculators are useful tools, but people rely on them too much.

Calculators will always provide a precise answer but unless you also perform an estimate along with the number punching, your result (the calculator's answer) may be off by orders of magnitude. Calculators have no "does this answer make sense?" button. Many, if not most, people today have not learned proper estimation skills to determine whether or not the answer provided by the calculator makes any sense.

Calculators also engender false precision. This is often seen when someone is providing metric conversion of imperial units: "add about six inches (152.4 mm) of extra material to allow for waste". Such a statement is ridiculous. The author is saying that some amount of extra material should be added to a measurement to make sure that you don't end up with too little. Providing an allowance with 100 micron precision is meaningless. It would be more appropriate to say "add about 6 inches (150 mm) to allow for waste". Yet, since the calculator said 152.4, people just blindly copy the number without thinking about what it means.

False precision is one of my pet peeves.

So my overall position is that people tend to use answers provided by a calculator without thinking about whether or not those answers are meaningful.

Answer 6

Yes I do believe that it has hurt the learning process. A lot of children do not know how to do mental math. They can't tell you what 6*7 is unless they have a calcualtor. While harder math like complex algebra, calculus, and trig may be good disciplines to use a calculator with schools are letting kids use them for the simple stuff. This will only hurt them in the long run because they never had to fully learn the basics because a calculator did it for them.

Answer 7

Yes, I believe that calculators have eliminated the need to learn basic math skills just like Yahoo Answers has given rise to a whole new group of cheaters who are not learning how to do their own work because they get other people to do it for them. Some of them do not even have the courtesy to ask a question, they just cut and paste their assignments.

Answer 8

I look at children (in general) now who can't even do basic math or logic problems without a calculator... they struggle to calculate simple equations and can barely do their multiplication tables. Figuring out a 15% tip on a restaurant bill is beyond them - and they stare at price tags like it's a foreign language when they see the item is discounted 10 - 20%.

I know that those that still "need" to use math in their selected courses of study can do it just as well as they used to (engineering, computer science, and other "nerd" students still excell in these skills) - but there seem to be more and more people who just throw their hands up and say, "I can't do math!!" - and it's "acceptable" to them!!

Watch an episode or two of "Beauty and the Geek" and you tell me how the women on that show function in society!

I grew up in the 80's when we weren't allowed calculators except in our "higher math" classes (I couldn't use one in math class 'til I hit calculas in the 7th grade) - this meant we had to either do the "long math" to figure out equations or figure out "mental tricks" which computed the numbers faster in order to do our equations.

My father, who went to school in China before the age of calculators can juggle numbers in his head to a level which amazes me to this day.

Maybe this means we're getting lazier as the generations pass or these tools (calculators / mini computers) are taking a lot of the "thinking" away from us.

...I can't remember phone numbers anymore ever since I started programming them into my cell-phone - so I'm just as much of a victim of this as the rest of us.

Answer 9

I think calculators like computers are a natural part of the technological evolution. You still have to generally know the basics of the math before use the calculator, just as you have to know how to write a letter before you can use Microsoft Word.

I think the bigger question is text messaging causing our children to have 'serious' spelling problems?

Answer 10

I taught math in Ghana when calculators were outlawed in the classroom,although slide rules were OK. Only rich kids could afford calculators 25 yrs. ago. My best math teacher taught us how to quickly do computations in our heads, and this skill still amazes others and helps me when I'm driving or drawing. Calculators are now so widepread that quick arithmetical skills are becoming obsolete.