What is an abacus?
Q: What is an abacus?
A: An abacus is an old tool used for arithmetic. It consists of beads on rods that can be moved to do addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and find the square root of whole numbers.
Q: How is it used?
A: Abacuses are still used in some parts of the world, and they are well suited for use in shops and street markets. Sometimes blind people use an abacus because they can feel the numbers easily.
Q: Is it faster than a calculator?
A: Expert abacus users can sometimes do math faster than basic calculators.
Q: What is a common Chinese abacus like?
A: A common Chinese abacus is split into two kinds of basic rows - the top row for "5"s and the bottom row for "ones". There are one or two beads in the top rows, and four or five beads in the bottom ones. Every column represents a different digit.
Q: How does it represent numbers?
A: The number 8 would be represented by one bead on top and three below, because 5 + 3 = 8.
Q: Can you do more than just addition with an abacus?
A: Yes, you can also do subtraction, multiplication, division and find the square root of whole numbers with an abacus.
