Simple math operations and Asperger's?

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I read these two items in the "You might be an Aspie if..." thread.
I know the thread is light hearted, butI don't understand how they relate to Asperger's, despite them mirroring my own experiences. Could someone elaborate?
-"...if you forgot how to divide every summer break in school"
-"You can remember the entire schedule or the two bus routes from your house to the city, but you can't remember how to reduce fractions after 3 years."
Thanks

It's just for fun. Don't take it seriously. Lot of of it is based on experiance or personality.

Those 2 examples might refer to suffering from dyscalculia.

I always had trouble with basic arethmatic but am wizzing through algebra. I probably have dyscalculia with a combonation of not being taught the right way.

I had difficulty grasping fractions and it took me a while to learn how to do them and I couldn't learn the rules of algebra and it was too abstract for me anyway. I don't think I have dyscalculia because I never got numbers turned around.

Good lord... I seriously had to double check that 7+4 was 11 one day >< In my defense, I was frazzled and w/o a calculator (I DO NOT TRUST MY MENTAL MATHS!) I got a 400-something in the math the first time I took my GRE

Yeah, i tend to have trouble doing mental math for anything involving more than 2-3 digits and some decimals. However, if i have a piece of paper ready, I'm all over it . . . amazing how its always the basics that can screw one up.

This.

I can do integrals, but cannot do 23+62 in my head.

i'm great at adding substrating dividing and multiplying big numbers in my head. math always seemed simple to me the math i get in high school i grasp with very little practis. my mom is a math teacher though but its not like she helpes me. oh and meercat

I found fractions a breeze too. Multipaticion and substraction were what were the hardest. If I couldn't cound on my fingers, I was doomed when it came to addition. Why does it piss some teachers off? I need a visual representaive of that number.

I had a lot of trouble with higher mathematics, because I have trouble with spatial skills and visual perception. I was very good when I was younger w addition, subtraction and multipication. I could also count by any number and apparently knew prime numbers at 3 years old. I was able to learn these more simple math skills by rote...my rote memory has always been very good. However when it came to anything to do with place value or geometry I always had a lot of trouble and I still do. I have Non-Verbal LD comorbid with AS.

I think, OP, that different people with AS have different comorbid learning problems (or absence of lcomorbid learning problems) which give them different cognitive stregths and weakneses. Some excell at higher mathematics, and have particularily good spatial ability. Others might have discalulia and struggle with basic calulations....but may be very advanced in other areas etc.

Thanks everyone, really made me see the vast differences in the problems we all experience.

I am very good at adding, ok at multiplication, division and subtraction but if the numbers get too big I can't keep them in my head. On paper I can do all very good. I guess it is because of the way I do it:

3456 * 234

I would break down to

(3456 * 200) + (3456 * 30) + (3456 * 4)

I have to keep track of too many numbers and I am not good at that.

I really loved geometry in school too, was good at it. For some reason it seemed so easy, all the values just fell into place. Then calculus (the y=x^2, y=x^3 sorta stuff), well I never got it, it was always just gibberish, I could never see the rules for it. I *passed* but never did well.

Anyway I guess why I am good at mentally doing simple arithmetic in my head is because of games, if I can sell [item] for x gold how much do I need to make y gold

I was always good with numbers and still enjoy doing mental arithmetic.

I really loved working imaginary numbers especially the paradox that even though there really is NO square root of a negative number, it is absolutley essential to permit and use the concept in order to harness the power of complex numbers.

I often drift off into an arithmetic daze in the middle of a conversation if there is even the slightest mention of a calculation by someone else.

Conversely I was always confused by the assertion of one of my teachers in grade school that;

'Comprehension is NIL'

Of course I now know that he was correct and the reason for my poor comprehension but..........such sensitivity.............oh to be back in the 70's!

I don't think you have to have that particular problem to have dyscalculia.

Last edited by Skilpadde on 17 Jan 2010, 6:57 am, edited 1 time in total.

85............. 3+2 = 5 and 6+2 = 8

seems you and i are switched. Doing the above is easy for me. But i can not to integrals.