Friday, February 17, 2012

As Smart-ish As a 5th Grader

A bit of background information:


I was an excellent math student through junior year of high school which happens to be the last time I was a math student. I did take statistics in college, but that doesn't really count. I did not to take calculus my senior year of high school as I did not enjoy the calculus teacher that I had suffered through geometry with and I had fulfilled the math requirement for college, so I opted out. I was not required to take any real math in college so I did not.


Scott took various calculus classes in college. Yay him! This gives him the impression that he's better in math than me. You be the judge.


Last night:


Our 5th grader was doing double digit long division and she asked Mr. Math for help. 


Scott to me: "Do you remember the secret to double digit long division?"


Me: "I don't know any secret. It's like single digit, but with 2 digits."


Scott: "It's been a long time since I've done long division. It's like this right?" He then leans over and shows me the paper where he's started a problem like this:




Me: "Why are you starting on the far right?"


Scott: "That's where you start."


Me: "That's not where I'd start. I'd do it like this.":


I started at the furtherest left that the 6 was divisible into like you are supposed to.

Scott then tries to complete the problem his way and realizes he's.... wait for it....WRONG.

Me: "How sad is it that I'm feeling totally superior right now?"

Scott: "I'm glad you get to feel like that for once."

While all this was going on the girl, our 5th grader, is saying things like:

"Give me back my paper."

"This isn't helping me."

We ignored her of course because what mattered was which one of us was right.

About 5 minutes later Scott bested me on a chemistry question so my superiority in the realm of 5th grade homework was short lived. 

It was lovely while it lasted.

peace & love ;-)

No comments:

Post a Comment

What say you?