Daily Math

Math finds it's way out of the classroom and into my daily life all the time. Mainly, I use it to determine how much longer I have to do something I don't want to do. In the slowest classes of the day, I find myself saying, "one quarter done, one half done, three quarters done." Working through the longest homework assignments, with problem after problem after problem, I encourage myself but giving myself a fractional representation of how far I've progressed. In cross country, on the difficult hill workouts, I use fractions to determine how many out of 10 I've done. My application for fractions, although somewhat negative, works for me. I can quickly break 5/8 down into a percent by knowing that 100 divided by 8 is about 12, and 5 x 12 is 60. Approximately 60%. When taking a time-pressured test, I use math to determine if I can finish in time, by seeing how much time I have left, converting that into a fraction, then seeing what fraction of the test I have left to do. Running through all of these calculations doesn't take long, and I do it almost subconsciously. Math can be a great help in our daily lives.