BellaOnline Forums Education Math How do you use math in your job?

This morning MSN had an article on its homepage about how people use math in the real world.

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I do financial modelling for customer loyalty programs so I use Excel all the time and create forumlae to do my maths for me. I also use MYOB (Quickbooks)accounting packages and of course there is lots of maths needed in these packages despite that they are have many automatic features. In the financial management contracts I have I set up excel spreadsheets to calculate and confirm the entries in my accounting package, plus I run business analysis etc.

As a Bellaonline editor I have a spreadsheet set up which will calculate for me my traffic. I dump the Bellaonline traffic and newsletter info into my spreadsheet and then it calculates what my articles are doing on a month by month basis.

Very interesting. I like the way you use excel to verify your contracts. The idea of placing your article traffic on a spreadsheet grabs my attention too. I may consider something like that for myself.

I clean homes part time so I am measuring cleaning solutions and knowing 1/2 and 1/4 makes a difference. Also as a homemaker I always am using math in my cooking. When I go to the store, and esp. when counting pennies, it has helped me to be able to calculate approx. what my groceries will cost, whether in my head or on a scratch paper.

I am also a genealogists. I use numbers to do order familis. I sometimes have to calculate a birth, marriage or death date. When I travel it is good to be able to estimate how many more miles I need to go.

There is so much we use math for day to day. I never thought about it as a student, just glad I paid a little attn in class so I can function in today's math world.

Cleaning and Cooking uses math with fractions? Oh My!and it didn't hurt. In fact, you reap nice rewards...a clean house....chocolate chip cookies. However, if anyone needs help with fractions, you take a look at my new article, Fraction Fun - Book Review

I couldn't resist the opportunity to mention the article.

You're right, Tina. We use math continuously without thinking about it. For instance, I just glanced at the time and determined it's almost time for me to go to bed.

Ok, I'm a certified mathophobe. I simply never got math.


I cheerfully went through life ignoring math until I took up spinning. That's spinning as in making yarn. Then all of a sudden I find myself needing to figure ratios, twist angles, how twist per inch (tpi) in singles affects tpi in plied yarn, fiber blending percentages, calculating how much grease fleece is needed to make how much yarn at what grist to knit or weave something. Not to mention all the math that's needed for dyeing, and designing a sweater or a woven piece....Yikes...Phi, Fibonacci, and those dreadful evil metrics!!

So all this led to having to figure out at least a few basics of math. Now I'm writing articles for my Bella site about the basic math used in handspinning. I know many people panic at the mere sight of a math formula - I'm one of them - so I try my best to keep it really simple and explain every step of the necessary calculations.

When we go to McDonalds or such we always try to either give exact change, or change that results in an even coin back (a quarter or such). So that's fun.

When I deposit checks, I always manually add them up, to keep my brain lubed.

I was a teacher!