Elementary arithmetic is the simplified portion of arithmetic which includes the operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
Elementary arithmetic starts with the natural numbers and the written symbols (digits) which represent them. The process for combining a pair of these numbers with the four basic operations traditionally relies on memorized results for small values of numbers, including the contents of a multiplication table to assist with multiplication and division.
Elementary arithmetic also includes fractions and negative numbers, which can be represented on a number line.
The abacus is an early mechanical device for performing elementary arithmetic, which is still used in many parts of Asia. Modern calculating tools which perform elementary arithmetic operations include cash registers, electronic calculators, and computers.
Read more about Elementary Arithmetic: The Digits, Addition, Successorship and Size, Counting, Subtraction, Multiplication, Division, Educational Standards
Famous quotes containing the words elementary and/or arithmetic:
“Listen. We converse as we live—by repeating, by combining and recombining a few elements over and over again just as nature does when of elementary particles it builds a world.”
—William Gass (b. 1924)
“Under the dominion of an idea, which possesses the minds of multitudes, as civil freedom, or the religious sentiment, the power of persons are no longer subjects of calculation. A nation of men unanimously bent on freedom, or conquest, can easily confound the arithmetic of statists, and achieve extravagant actions, out of all proportion to their means; as, the Greeks, the Saracens, the Swiss, the Americans, and the French have done.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)