Why Maths is easy

Maths is easy. Why is maths easy? Because you don’t have to understand it to do it. All you have to do is learn the routines and apply them. Of course it is better if one understands why one has to do the calculation in a particular way, but is not necessary. When I was at school, subtraction of a larger number from a smaller number was accomplished by “borrowing” a ten, which then later had to be paid back. As a 9 year old I heard another pupil in the class ask the teacher where the ten was being borrowed from. I remember thinking “That’s a good question, I don’t know the answer to that” and listening in carefully. The sums we were doing must have be money calculations, because the teacher replied crossly, “I don’t know… from the bank.” I remember thinking of the teacher “She hasn’t answered the question”, but I also remember my next thought, “It doesn’t matter. As long as I continue to follow the routine I will continue to get the sums right, and that’s all that matters.” So I never questioned where the ten came from again until I started teaching maths. It was then that I realised that my teacher hadn’t evaded the question in quite the way I’d thought. In the method of subtraction I was taught the ten is indeed borrowed from outside the sum. It’s an extra ten that is introduced and corrupts the numbers in the sum until such time as it’s paid back. I didn’t understand at the time, but then I didn’t need to.