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abax (ancient counting board)

suan pan (chinese abacus)

soroban (japanese abacus)

Introducing the Abacus
(By the way, the plural of abacus is abaci, and is pronounced ab' ba see. It's from the Latin. The Oxford English Dictionary gives the plural as "abacuses." Doesn't exactly roll of the tongue, though, does it? )

  The abacus is a fun tool to do math with. It helps you learn all about the base ten system (which is the one we use for ordinary math), patterns among numbers, and how to do math in your head. It is probably the best tool in the world for most people to get a good grasp of numbers with.

   "Why should I learn to use an abacus, when I can use a calculator?" is one of the questions I hear most. People think that the abacus is just "some exotic toy." That would be like calling Galileo just "some Italian guy."

  The main reason to learn how to use an abacus, is because it will teach you how to manipulate numbers - how each digit relates to the others, and how to use that knowledge to get very good at understanding how to do all the major operations - addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.

   The abacus will also give you a handle on how base systems work. For instance, you can use an abacus to do math in the decimal system (which we use in everyday math) and the binary system (which is used in computer science).

   Understanding decimals becomes a breeze when you know how to use an abacus.Exponents and square roots can also be done with a little practice.

"Is it hard to use an Abacus?"

   Not at all! It's a lot easier than learning the way you already learned math.

"How can I start learning how to use an Abacus?"

   Of course, the best way is if you have a real abacus. But you you can start here by learning the principle of how an abacus works. The best way to learn that, is to learn a little history of the abacus. If you look at the three abaci ("abaci" is the plural of abacus) you will see that each have some differences. It took thousands of years to develop from the abax to the soroban. How did that happen? You can read the history of the abacus here, but first lets start learning how the counting board works. Click on the image below.

click here for the first lesson about the abax