The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1907-07-18
EDUCATIONAL.
BY w. +. LARSON.
SOME ARITHMETIC.

found to weigh 24G0 pounds. y. X. has
sou II years old who is smart mt fig
gering," and so this youth was given the
work of computing the cost. He ran in
to the house and came back with sheet
of legal cap and "A pencil Then he seat
while the old men conversed about the
importance of arithmetic - the school
curriculum.
The young mathematician went to
work The price was Sl3 per ton. He
divided 246O by 90O0 and got | and
400 20OO which, reduced down, gave and
23O 1000, | and ll5.500, and 23.lO0 tons.
This number was now to be multiplied
y l3 Reducing the mixed number to
an improper fraction he got l23lO0
123.l0Or IL 1899 100.
1899 divided 10y 100 Is and 80 100 dol.
lars Answer
He reported the result to the men who
were pleased with the boy $ ability to
get such n difficult answer in 80 short II
time. (The boy had worked only five
minutes
Now it happened that y. Il has boy
II years of age. As he lived in another
district his boy had attended another
school On his way home he began to
wonder how his own boy was getting
along in iiggers". He had never bother.
ed himself much about school affairs,
but now he decided that he would give
his boy that problem to see what school
had done for him. The boy met him at
the gate and ~ he opened it, the father
yelled out
This load weighs 1850 pounds. What
is it worth MT Sl3 TOM
After studying for about ID seconds,
the boy said promptly: Fifteen dollars
and 80 cents.
The old man almost drove his load in.
| to the mail box 40 astonished was he at
his boys "hggering What he had
thought was remarkable for his neigh
bor's boy to do in ) minutes his own boy
had done in 10 seconds After the
horses had been put into the stable, he
asked his boy how he could do all that
'fggering' without legal cap and pencil
That's easy enough" said the boy.
IF you had 40 pounds more you would
have Just ton and II quarter and that
would be SlG %. At Sl3a ton, l00pounds
cost 65 cents 10 pounds cost 6! cents
and 40 pounds 2G cents. Twenty.s six
cents from Sl6 % leaves $500.
The two methods outlined above il
lnstrate two kinds of work done in
school, The first is the old, impractical
book method the second the common
sense, practical method The first boy
| tried to manipulate figures and by means
of some old book rule got IN answer
while the second saw the situation ut u
glance.
Much of our education il to bookiah
We are brought mp with the idea that
the knowledge of dead words and formu.
lae is education. The result is Y. X :
boy, thongh very often much more pitt
| able. He knew in u way how to get
there, though he took an antiuuated
method. The child brought up on mere
book learning, whether arithmetic or
geography, is SOFT of hot house plant
that cannot stand the cold of the actual
world outside of books Outside Of the
educational green house he drops and
willis
The cube problem is one which shows
the absurdty of many of these book
people. How many , inch cubes can
you put into box measuring 20 inches
4 . inches < inches on the inside?
1t would seem impossible that anyone
with the least bit of common sense
could fail on that question. Three rows
of six cubes each will go into the bottom.
| Then another tier and the work il done,
~ 36 cubes But what does this care.
fully Cy) trained student dot
20 0..S=lii0 Gu. in. in the box
3 ; 21 en-. in in cube.
- into lii0 goes 53A times
! Answer SO cubes
The student (?J has not handled the
real thing of life enough His training
working by rule.
Aud the wood problem Even train.
ed teachers will persist in multiplying
the length, width, and height together
and dividing by l2s. A farmer who has
had no arithmetic at all would never go
through that nonsense. An educational
person oughht to be one of infinite IL
mount Of common sense, one who can
do simple things in the simplest way
. yes, these carpet problems, too. one
would son etimea think that some of the
educated people never had seen "A carpet,
the way they throw numbers together.
Let us get ont of some of these ruts.
| You laugh at u man who does not dress
in modern costume. Some of these
antiquated ways of doing things in
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