Re: Finger-Counting: More Than Just "This Little Piggy..."

In third grade I remember learning a system for multiplying my nines that
used fingers. With both hands stretched open, count fingers from the left.
To adopt your notation.
Step 1: hands ready. 0000|0 0|0000
Step 2: count from left and put down finger. Use 9 times 2 as example.
0.00|0 0|0000
The amount of fingers on the left is times ten, and the right is ones.
So (1*10)+(8*1)=18. Basically it just gives you the decimal system.
The reason it works is because two-digit multiples of nine always add up to
nine. Minus one finger, as a marker, that's the fingers of your hand.

Jake


~Patient is the procrastinator.~

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