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When I was a fifth grader in China, we were required to memorize all prime numbers below 100. Curious if that is common in other countries?
by HeavenFox 5y ago
When I was a fifth grader in China, we were required to memorize all prime numbers below 100.
Curious if that is common in other countries?
- antman 5y agoI don't think so. Remember any other interesting numbers list you needed to memorize?
- tokamak-teapot 5y agoI learned all the integers.
- eCa 5y agoWhat is the highest integer you know?
- agentwiggles 5y agon + 1 ∀ n ∈ N
- asddubs 5y agothat's not an integer, that's a set
- eesmith 5y agoIf I were able to count them out loud, in order? 999 nonillion, 999 octillion, 999 septillion, 999 sextillion, 999 quintillion, 999 quadrillion, 999 trillion, 999 million, 999 thousand, 999. That is (after consulting a table), 1 decillion - 1. I clearly come from from a short scale culture. If I switched to the long scale and Chuquet names I could, of course, go to 999 nonilliard, 999 nonnillion, 999 octilliard, etc.
- tokamak-teapot 5y ago83
- faeyanpiraat 5y agoHow is that useful?
- healthysurf 5y agoVast majority of my school experience wasn't useful
- HeavenFox 5y agoIt is very useful in the context of Chinese grade school. There are a lot of exam problems that require factorization, and calculators are banned. Having a list of primes memorized comes really handy.
- Igelau 5y agoFrivolous memory tasks as a measurement of bureaucratic aptitude?
- JoelMcCracken 5y agoLol right because I never had to memorize the multiplication tables, states capitols, electron shell levels and numbers, periodic tables, etc in the US
- Zababa 5y agoI don't think that was a thing in France (at least where I went to school) but we often used them indirectly to simplify fractions, so all in all maybe we had to know all primes under 25 I think?
- munchbunny 5y agoIt isn't standard in the US, although at some point I memorized them to prepare for buzzer races in math competitions. It was in no way reflective of anything useful in real life, but it was fun. There were a few sets of common numbers, formulas, and mental calculation tricks that were useful to just always have in the back of your head. Perfect squares and cubes under 1000, powers of 2 and 3, prime numbers below 100, interior angles of regular polygons up to 10 sides, binomial coefficients, Pythagorean triples, factorials up to 9!, common roots out to 3-4 decimal places, and a few others that I've no longer needed for almost 20 years at this point.
- kccqzy 5y agoWhen I was a fifth grader we were required to memorize all prime numbers below 20.
- Tempest1981 5y agoWe memorized pi to 7 decimal places... a few memorized it to 20+
- CamperBob2 5y agoNow I, even I, would celebrate In rhymes unapt, the great Immortal Syracusan, rivalled (sic) nevermore Who, in his wondrous lore, Passed on before, Left men his guidance How to circles mensurate.
- I_complete_me 5y agoIndeed. But I find "How I want a drink, alcoholic of course, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics." sufficient for most of my needs.