The marvellous counting machine

After a time, people stopped making grooves in the sand and using pebbles for counters.This had given them the idea for a marvellous invention-a counting machin. They made a wooden frame and inside it they strung pebbles or bread on wires .They then had a counting machine that was easy to use and could be carried around.

This counting machine, called an abacus, is a tool that was invented by people in almost every part of the world.The baby lonians and Egyptians used the abacus 5,000 years ago. so did the chinese. And when the spaniards came to America in the sixteenth century, they found the Maya Indians using the abacus.

When you by somthing in a shop you go up to the counter to pay for it. Have you ever wondered why it is called acounter? It's because long ago a counter was the place where merchants sat and counted on their abacus.Today that's where the cash register is.But many shopkeepers in China and other part of Asia still use an abacus.

An abacus can be used to work out all kinds of counting problem. If you know how to use it you can solve problems very quickly.In fact,there have been contests in which a person using an abacus managed to work out some problems faster than a person using an electronic calculator!