Mathematics A skill for life…..

What question is asked by a lot of students in mathematics lessons? When am I ever going to use this in my life…..

There is no simple answer but I have roughly 480 seconds to try and convince you all that there is a purpose to both loving mathematics and that learning mathematical skills for life is important to your life …

#reality get on with it for now….. Apart from passing an exam that you have to take in an education system you cannot change yet, so #reality get on with it for now….. you probably will not use …. However, ….

Having a comfortableness with numbers and developing a logical thought process in solving problems is in reality what learning all those mathematical skills that you come across in lessons are all about…. An example…

Firstly statistics suggests you guys will typically live until your in your 80’s or more…. Secondly the Government expect you to work for 68% of your potential working life, present projections from the Government Work & Pensions Department suggest then that you will be expected to work until you are 72 before the Government will provide you with a state pension!

Can you imagine working until you are 72 years old!

I suspect you would like some choice of whether you work until you are 72 or over or retire a little earlier! So how much money do you need to save to retire early and still have enough money to live on?

To generate this monthly income I would need to have saved £660,000 over my working life…. I haven’t saved this amount!! (worked 38 years so far, I would have had to save roughly £17000 per year! My first salary was roughly £6500 per year!), so how….

I decided to take education seriously and realised it opens opportunities if I wanted to take them…. There is no doubt that - Having mathematics qualifications can allow choices - Learning mathematical skills for life can allow choices

-Not having mathematical qualifications -Not having mathematical skills #Reality – limits choices #Reality – allows others to take advantage of you #Reality – you may have to work until you are 72+ #Reality – an ability to apply and interpret data is the key to many future jobs

#Reality - There is no such person as a maths person just a person who decides that something is important to allow life choices to be made and then does something about it… life is what you want it to be….

Use your 86400 seconds given to you each day wisely! Invest in your future at every opportunity… And remember everybody can learn new mathematical skills…..