Is BODMAS a recent thing ie last 40 years or so .. or has it always been around?

[loveyouradvice]

I don't remember learning it at schools - and I remember using FAR more brackets all over the place which guided order of actions....

It’s been around a while.

https://5010.mathed.usu.edu/Fall2013/PJensen/History.html

it’s not a logical requirement of maths, it’s more like deciding how to write it. So like deciding which words get capital letters (English - start of sentence, German - proper nouns as well).

Agree that grammar wasn't explicitly taught when I was at school though...only learnt it properly once I started MFL!

I'm 65. It wasn't used at my Scottish high school.

One of my classmates is now a Head of Maths in a secondary school; the other is a Maths professor at uni. They've both said that more brackets were used when we were at school.

Learnt it in the 80s

It’s referenced in the bible and I believe it might have been the 11th commandment so it’s been around a while.

My mother is 80 and was taught this at secondary school in the mid 50s aged 11. It wasn’t called BODMAS then. It was just called the order of operations and my mother was taught it with the phrase ‘Bless My Dear Aunt Sally’. So it has variations but as a principle it has been taught for a very long time.

Convention.

Brackets really make things much easier.

lol English start of sentence and proper nouns; German all nouns!

French tho - don’t get me started, hardly anything apart from your actual name :)

@Blobbitymacblob it is definitely convention and necessary for calculators etc to have a fixed rule so there is only one answer otherwise there could be multiple answers.

@WearyAuldWumman - this is my memory too!! Brackets all over the place...

and although I did Maths at A level, and got a Cambridge place to read Economics I was taught Maths very badly at school... only once I did my Cambridge Entrance exams did I discover that I'd only been taught half the syllabus because my teacher referred International Rugby half the time!!!

@WaitedBlankey - You win!!!

83 year old Dad is DEFIITELY going to be greatest authority on this.... fascinating...

He did a Maths degree at University College back in the day.

I'm 59, and I learned it at school at about 9 or 10. Doubt it was new then

Those of you who ‘didn’t learn it’…

In 2+ 3x, if x= 5, what does the expression equal?

if you think 17, you were taught it, as you knew to work out 3x5 first, then add the 2, even though I put the +2 first. You have not have been taught ‘BODMAS’ but you must have been taught the order to do things in.

if you think 25, perhaps you weren’t taught it (or you’ve forgotten it!) and presumably you didn’t do very well in any maths qualification you did.

I don’t think it was added to the primary curriculum til 2014, but I was definitely taught it in y7 when algebra was introduced.

I'm 57 and didn't do it as at School
I did go to a fairly rubbish school though

I was taught it in the early 70s and it wasn’t a new thing then. Brackets do make things more obvious though

Well @Okiedokie123I found Maths difficult. I was in top set with several different teachers during my gcse study years, lots of other kids who disrupted lessons and I just remember being given a text book and working through it. I think I would have done a lot better at a different school. This is something I often reflect on, as I did well in other subjects and having seen how my children are taught things may have been different.

I’m 48, went to a posh school, and was taught BMDAS (Bless My Dear Aunt Sally). Does this not mean that I was taught it a different way around to the rest of you? And where was the O? I am so confused now!

I learnt it in the 1950s, but without the acronym.

@Namechange87654321 I dont know where your O went but the order of M and D or A and S doesn't matter as multiplication and division have equal status and so does addition and subtraction. You would do the M and D first in order left to right and then do A and S left to right as well.

We were taught it at school. I’m in my 60’s. I have no idea what it means but I recognise it.

I did it at GCSE. Am mid 40s

Some early calculators didn’t use BODMAS but mathematicians have always needed a generally agreed order of operations.

I’m early 40s and was taught it, although I had forgotten all about it until I started helping DS (11) with his homework. I was having to google so much stuff. I’ve never needed it in my day to day life until this point.

I’m 61 and learned this in primary school. It wasn’t new then either, as my dad (a statistician) helped me with my homework and talked about it.