I FINALLY LEARNED LONG DIVISION!

I feel so empowered! I CAN DO IT!

Although my co-worker, Lauren Carlile, was a grade behind me in elementary school we both had the same fifth grade teacher: Mrs. Busco. Lauren and I ended up talking about our elementary math experience. I told Lauren that I had struggled struggled struggled with all-things-math until junior high, where the struggle decreased by 2% (likely due to a greater amount of time spent on explanation of concepts). I was a really smart kid-- but math was sticky in my brain; it just didn't compute.

Defending my own honor I said, "Hey! I'm a brilliant history whiz BYU student who tested out of freshman math...I just can't do long division... and once told Dylan that 9+12=23."

Exasperated, Lauren said "but you remember Mrs. Busco's long division, right? Daddy, Mommy, Sister, Brother, sometimes Rover?"

Eh? Noooooo, I do not remember that. I remember learning history and grammar from Mrs. Busco, and and I remember cleaning out Nick Thurber's desk during recess with Heidi Egbert so we'd win the CivilWar unit desk inspection, and I remembered drawing human organ systems and watching Roots-- but I hold no recollection of learning math. Selective memory?

Lauren still remembered Busco's method, so I asked her to teach me. Using our white board at work, she helped me through some problems*. After long division, I converted the remainders into fractions and told Lauren how those worked. I've always loved fractions. :) It must be all the baking. Lauren hates fractions. I told her "No problem-- you can do calculus!" And she can.

I found this website to use for practice. It's ten times more fun than sudoku.

THANK YOU, LAUREN!


*Daddy= Divide, Mommy= Multiply, Sister= Subtraction, Brother= Bring it down, Rover= Remainder.