How to teach adults extremely basic maths? im trying to help someone who is in uni right now and they need to pass a basic maths test (w/o calculator) to continue their course. I'm trying to explain to them division (which they especially struggle with) and they can hardly understand the concept of division. its like their only way to understand maths is with "tricks" that help them get the answer but ultimately dont teach them what the maths is actually fucking doing. like, 5/15 to her is "three 5s go into 10 so therefore the answer is 3". they get by doing this, but as soon as something like 7.5/5 they just dont fucking understand it at all. they ask themself, "how many 5s fit into 7.5?" but they just say 1 and dont understand how the answer could be 1.5.

are most people really fucking like this? did education fail them that much? how the hell do you explain the very basic fundamentals of maths like division to a person who literally doesn't understand the concept of division.