Definitions by Numerati
Precalculus
A euphemistic term for a course study on middle-school and high-school algebra and trigonometry for those who have to read calculus, or who have flunked their calculus before—a prerequisite for those who sign for STEM modules in college.
Precalculus by Numerati June 19, 2025
Mathematical Purrfection
When educators who are cat lovers love to pose creative math questions—and mathematical quickies or trickies—that center around their pets (or “masters of the house”), or are attracted by real-life word problems that embrace the feline family.
Two brain-unfriendly questions that exhibit mathematical purrfection are:
1. At a Cats’ Café, how many cute kittens are there if there are 9 more legs than tails?
2. Guesstimate the average cat bill at the veterinarian over her lifestyle.
1. At a Cats’ Café, how many cute kittens are there if there are 9 more legs than tails?
2. Guesstimate the average cat bill at the veterinarian over her lifestyle.
Mathematical Purrfection by Numerati June 18, 2025
The Uberization of Singapore Math
When students, teachers, and homeschoolers could access affordable or quasi-free quality grades K–12 math resources based on the math curriculum from the “fine” city of Singapore, by bypassing traditional channels of distribution or mercenary middlepersons.
Thanks to print on demand (POD), the Uberization of Singapore math has significantly leveled the playing field for self-published authors and small publishers, as they needn’t rent a warehouse to store their books and rely on cut-throat distributors and bookstores to sell their titles.
The Uberization of Singapore Math by Numerati June 17, 2025
Pi Prank
Some silly, reckless, or deadly act underperforming or poorly motivated students perform on their oft-mean teacher on Pi Day, be it for fun, malice, or revenge—when these rowdies or troublemakers want to get even with adults on this most popular date in the math calendar.
Math
A four-letter word that traditionally used to be called “arithmetic” in elementary or primary school—the third “R” in Reading, wRiting, and aRithmetic. A much-disliked school subject that is mostly used as a social filter to separate the nerds from the herd, or to politically decide the future haves and the have-nots in society.
Unlike our parents and grandparents who’re schooled in old-school math, we’re now taught new math (which includes new ways to add, subtract, and multiply numbers), Common Core math (which incorporates many new math techniques), and Singapore math (which integrates the concrete-pictorial-abstract (CPA) approach to learning math and the bar model method to solve word problems).
Mindful Modeling
When the conscious effort of coming up with an apt model drawing that connects the knowns and unknowns in a math word problem can enhance the readability or elegance of a solution—when a “look-see” proof could arouse an aha! in the problem solver.
If only more math educators were to practice mindful modeling, the number of students or homeschoolers embracing Singapore’s bar model method could potentially increase ten folds in no time.
Mindful Modeling by Numerati June 11, 2025
The Moronification of Singapore Math
The process of making the Singapore math curriculum, or part of it, accessible to all dummies and idiots, especially among those who have an irrational fear of the bar model method, which is the soul and heart of Singapore’s elementary school mathematics.
Mathepreneurs leverage on the moronification of Singapore math to help raise the quantitative literacy of millions of math-anxious or mathophobic students and their parents worldwide, who have since become better and more confident problem solvers.
The Moronification of Singapore Math by Numerati April 8, 2025