Quote:
Originally Posted by Paul mabbott  no wonder we have so many problems with applied mathematicians and scientists (or lack of them) in this country when children don't use the same methodology as most of the world and are often actively discouraged from doing so. |
My son has just left school with six grade A A-Levels, including maths, further maths and physics, and he is about to start on a four year MMath degree at the University of Warwick. The sum total of his education in imperial measurements was one week in year 8 (2nd year at secondary school) when they covered conversion between the two systems. And it never came up in any of his exams. In every subject across the curriculum all measurements were exclusively metric - e.g. kilometres in geography, millimetres in DT, grams and millilitres in chemistry.
He, like most people his age, much prefers metric to imperial and if I'm honest I can see why people find it easier to work in multiples of ten. But some of the old imperial systems were not as daft as they look, especially the ones based on twelve (e.g. 12 inches in a foot, 12 pennies in a shilling). This is because of their divisors. If you exclude 1 and itself, 10 can only be divided into half or into fifths without involving fractions or decimals, whereas 12 can be divided into halves, thirds, quarters and sixths. This was quite important before the advent of pocket calculators and precise measuring devices. Which makes 14 ounces in a pound all the more puzzling!
Dave P.