Arithmetic: The Foundation of Mathematics

Arithmetic: The Foundation of Mathematics — page 1
Introduction magine a world without numbers How would someone tell time determine how far it is to drive to a concert in the next city find the total cost of a new smartphone or figure out a bank balance and the interest it has earned Numbers are part of daily life Arithmetic is the science of calculating with numbers People use numbers to measure time distance monetary values and more Rather than being a course in arithmetic this resource focuses on its operations Consider several goals of a high school student like making a budget planning to pay for college and keeping track of job earnings All these goals require arith metic Budgets involve adding income and subtracting expenses Finding the cost of college means subtracting financial aid from a school's sticker price Calculating a bank balance with job wage deposits and interest may use all six basic operations of arithmetic The six operations are addition sub traction multiplication division raising to powers and finding roots An example of raising to powers is the use of scientific notation This notation is a simplified way to write very small or very large numbers such as expressing distances in the solar sys tem or the number of acres in a town One