How To Use A Chinese Abacus: A step-by-step guide to addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, roots and more.

Typical of this author, the technical detail and writing style makes it very easy to understand and use the hexadecimal system of the Chinese with an abacus. I was very familiar with the hexadecimal system in computers, but this books explains how to incorporate this into it's use on the Chinese style abacus. Only until recently, I did not even know I Japanese used the decimal system for math and the Chinese used the hexadecimal system.

Exactly what I wanted! I bought an abacus but was a little sketchy on some of the arithmetic operations... no worries, because this book painstakingly lays out every single bit of knowledge in a very straightforward way in order to teach anyone how to use the abacus at your own pace. Best of all, the answer guide in the back lets you know if you made a mistake in your calculations to the sample problems questions offered, and the real world applications certainly were interesting to learn about.

I haven't been that far through this book, but I can say it makes learning abacus fun! I just wish it were a little cheaper. It's a good textbook, but a little pricey for my taste.

I bought this book wanting to learn how to use an abacus and have had no previous experience- I'm pretty sure I hadn't even held one before. This book is very easy to read and the directions are very clear. I strongly suggest it!

Book has a lot of interesting detail and history. It was a very good read. Packaging and arrival were as expected - very good.

Really Nice!

Not fond of instructions for division. Have a better book for that.

I have long been interested in the abacus. I bought my first one when I was 14 or so. It came with an instructional pamphlet that was hard to follow. This book has clear explanations and even exercises to make learning how to use an abacus easier. You still need to practice.

This is the best twenty quid I have spent this year so far! It is a very succinct and helpful guide to working the ancient (Chinese or Japanese) calculating systems that preceded the electronic calculator.... by 3,000 years! The explanations and diagrams are most lucid and helpful and and *meticulous* in the instuctions. I personally feel the author/publisher (Mr Paul Green) deserves an award for 'plain speaking'! His guide and diagram illustrations are most helpful, and could be easily understood by a kid, teenager, or an old bloke like me! Underneath the pragmatism and the obvious scholarship, I think Mr Green as a great LOVE of this subject, which he doesn't reveal, but has most generously given - donated - to us all. If you are interested in keeping your mind active - the Abacus is a great 'toy' (- on more levels than you can imagine) and learning the Wisdom of the Ancients, giving yourself a mental workout - this is the book for you! I highly recommend this book.... work at it, it will give you great joy and satisfaction. OK? Badger X

...ist genau das, was der Titel verspricht, eine Anleitung zur Erlernung des Abacus. Das Buch ist vollgestopft mit Uebungen, so dass es ganz egal ist, ob man Englisch beherrscht oder nicht. Vor lauter Zahlen sieht man ohnehin keinen Text :) Naja, vielleicht ist es etwas uebertrieben. Die einfache Struktur des Buches erlaubt ein ebenso einfaches Erlernen des Abacus-Rechnens. Von Null auf Hundert in zwei Tagen - und bis zum fließenden Gebrauch ist es auch nicht mehr weit. Also eine klare Empfehlung.

There is basically no way to not rate this book as rubbish. When adding the utterly simple 8 + 4, it is recommended to “think 4 = 10 - 6”. This is just completely not understanding how the abacus is used. Instead add 1 to the first column getting you to 9. Add 1 again, getting you to 10 ie 0 on the first column and 1 (one bead up on the lower deck). Then add 2 more on the first column, which reads 12. The point of the abacus use is you should NOT have to think of substracting mentally when doing an addition. How was this book reviewed???

It occurred to me that a blind person might be able to calculations with an Abacus because the positions of the beads and therefore numeric values could be determined by touch. So I bought some Abacus machines. One to use and the others as memory stores plus this book. I fully recommend the book because though it is for sighted people it teaches you every step very carefully. From my point of view I have been able to read it and teach blind people to do simple tasks. Very very good value. Alan Lovegreen

Very well written. I would recommend.