One of the fundamental differences between Inuit math and Eurocentric math is that the Inuit math, it is viewed that there are many ways to get to the same result. This is some that most people have a hard time getting their head around because Eurocentric ways are that there is one right way to get to the result, all other ways are wrong. I have many personal stories with this topic and many things that I want to improve on when I am a teacher. One common thing that I encountered is that teachers didn’t like it when students solved a problem a different way than what they had been taught in class. I was a good student, but I often didn’t understand the way that the teacher taught us, so I would go to other teachers and the internet to find a way that made sense to me, most teachers didn’t like that. The next difference is that Inuit math uses base 20, this stood out to me because I have (and many people) have only ever worked in base 10.  You see it everywhere; it makes the most sense to use because it is used in everything.

The last difference is that in Inuit math understanding is oral. Learning is based largely around spoken understand and saying what you know instead of writing and test taking. This is something that I love, the idea of solely judging someone’s ability and understanding based on how well they can take a test seems like a terrible idea. And being able to say and orally explain a topic actually gives you a much better understanding than anything else.