Abacus - What is Abacus

Abacus is a simple tool which was used in ancient times for calculating numbers through basic arithmetic system. For many centuries different races, cultures and countries have played an important role in the development of the tool. Different varieties of Abacus were developed, like Nepohualtzintzin in ancient Mayan culture during 900 B.C to 250 B.C) which used 5 /20 base, and the finally Soroban abacus was developed by Japan having 1/4 base which is widely used today. In the last 2 decades it has changed its status from just being a calculating device to brain development tool.

Function of abacus.

Abacus is used in various parts of the world especially in Asian countries like China, Japan, Korea. In these countries abacus is a part of basic elementary education and widely used for calculation. It involves operations such as additions, subtraction, multiplication, division, decimal no, Negative no’s and apart from these calculations, advance abacus techniques involve square roots, working with percentage, linear equations, long division, and elimination etc.

Mental Calculation

Mental calculation is a process where one performs the calculation without the help of any pen, pencil, paper, calculator or any other external medium. They perform the calculations depending on their mental ability. A mental calculation involves combined process such as listening, data storage and processing, logical implementation of desired functions to solve & at the end of process to reproduce the same confidently & correctly. All these are done in few seconds with accuracy.
Abacus training is initiated in a child with a set of rules. Initially the child learns to use the Abacus tool proficiently to give the correct answer. Gradually the child is taught to use the visualization skill and imagine an abacus, while the actual tool is removed. The child is then taught to calculate normally like they would do on abacus, but this time they will use the visualized abacus. Slowly as the time progresses the child confidently does larger digit calculations with speed and accuracy, without the aid of any tool.

Speed building software

MMA has developed special program called Speed Building Software (SBS in short) to enhance the skills of a child. The uniqueness of the software ensures that the child gets the benefits of traditional abacus while playing with SBS. Skills like concentration, speed, accuracy, logical reasoning, visualization and accuracy are enhanced. SBP is animation based program which ensure that the child has the interest to play. It is just like any other computer game but the fact remains that when you child plays this game his knowledge increases.