Yes indeed, “now” is the answer. Whether you’re readying for a test, balancing your checkbook or trying to figure out your mortgage rate, there’s no such thing as “tomorrow”, since “now” is always the right time to start learning that simple math trick that will make your life more enjoyable or lead you to a deeper understanding of your (sometimes not so) favorite subject matter.

But since “now” is the answer, now has also come the time for me to get serious about turning this Davies’ Dailies blog into “The World’s #1 Math Skills Development Website”. True, each and every Internet Marketing guru has an offer nowadays on the subject of “blogging for fun and profit” which might help me make my dream come true. Although I’m already carefully listening to the advice of such mentors as Mike Litman, Tellman Knudson, Mike Filsaime and Mike Antoni, I have also immensely benefited from Mark Joyner’s Simpleology courses since last summer.

I thought it was then only fair to let you know that…

I’m evaluating a multi-media course on blogging from the folks at Simpleology. For a while, they’re letting you snag it for free if you post about it on your blog.

It covers:

• The best blogging techniques.
• How to get traffic to your blog.
• How to turn your blog into money.

I’ll let you know what I think once I’ve had a chance to check it out. Meanwhile, go grab yours while it’s still free.

I love it, when people can put so much fun into basic maths learning, even when you suddenly realize what they dare call “Basic Maths” has unexpectedly stretched you to the limits of what you thought you once knew. Add to it the beauty of the simplicity they’ve put into its design, and voilà, you too will soon become a number nut.

Enjoy!

Although I’m new to Flimsy’s blog and must confess I haven’t read Dolly’s book, I happen to be one of those 70’s schoolboys who still does remember the pain of having to abandon arithmetic (and math skills grooming!) for “… new math, where you learn all about “sets” and graduate not knowing how to balance a checkbook”. That alone might make it worth putting this book on your “must read” list. But believe me, if you have a few spare moments left, just go and read Flimsy’s novelized life story at Bee Dancer of Nokota, with more on her background at Schizophrenia Sourcebook.

Amazing how such gifted people may go unnoticed sometimes…

We still have a few minutes left, which leaves me ample time to share one of Charles Davies’ views on math skills development with you:

“The mere practical man regards with favor only the results of science, deeming the reasonings through which these results are arrived at, quite superfluous. Such should remember that the mind requires instruments as well as the hands, and that it should be equally trained in their combinations and uses. Such is, indeed, now the complication of human affairs, that to do one thing well, it is necessary to know the properties and relations of many things. Every thing, whether existing in the abstract or in the material world; whether an element of knowledge or a rule of art, has its connections and its law: to understand these connections and that law, is to know the thing. When the principle is clearly apprehended, the practice is easy.”

Charles Davies, in The Logic and Utility of Mathematics
pp. 16-17, A.S Barnes & Burr Ed., New York, 1860

“Math is everywhere and yet, we may not recognize it because it doesn’t look like the math we did in school. Math in the world around us sometimes seems invisible. But math is present in our world all the time — in the workplace, in our homes, and in life in general.

You may be asking yourself, “How is math everywhere in my life? I’m not an engineer or an accountant or a computer expert” Math is in your life from the time you wake until the time you go to sleep. You are using math each time you set your alarm, buy groceries, mix a baby’s formula, keep score or time at an athletic event, wallpaper a room, decide what type of tennis shoe to buy, or wrap a present. Have you ever asked yourself, “Did I get the correct change?” or “Do I have enough gasoline to drive 20 miles?” or “Do I have enough juice to fill all my children’s thermoses for lunch?” or “Do I have enough bread for the week?” Math is all this and much, much more.”

Patsy F. Kanter, in Helping your Child Learn Math

Why “Lightning Maths”, will you ask? I was indeed struck by mathematics almost a third of a century ago, almost a lifetime love affair… In 2006, I was searching for a business to create, when a course on how to build a successful Internet-based venture led me to the discovery of the works of a 19th century West Point professor named Charles Davies, whose arithmetic method was used at the time by millions of Americans.