The Nine Trick

Industrial accident, or 9 x 7?

I’ve always been awful at math, just ask my checkbook. So I’ll gladly take any trick I can to cheat on multiplication tables. And weren’t nines the worst? No longer. At dinner tonight, my wife Jennifer (the teacher), solved that problem forever by teaching us the nine trick.

Here’s how it works; when multiplying by nine, hold up your hands and tuck down the finger that you are multiplying by (only works for single digits). The remaining fingers display your answer, with the digits on the left representing tens, and those to the right of the bent finger are ones. Nice. Where was this magic in the third grade when I needed it most?