Can you solve this? Harvard students can't but kindergarteners can.

Question

Brian deposits $6000

 into an account that pays simple interest at a rate of 6%

 per year. How much interest will he be paid in the first 3

 years?



Answer 1

6000

plus 6% = 6360 after one year

in 2 years add 6% of the original 6000

to get 6720 after two years

in 3 years, it's $7,080

but that's purely simple interest, with no compounding. No banks do that type of "simple interest"

if you calculated 6% of 6360 that would be compounding, not simple interest.

the compounding formula is A=P(1+r/n)^nt

A =6000(1.06)^3 = $7,146.10 after 3 years

for compounding annually which is $66.10 more than "simple interest" with no compounding

kindergarteners used to be able to solve this, but then came the pandemic, school closings and mandatory masks, setting every student back 2 years or more. 12th year high school grad is about 18. 1st grade age level about 7. preschool kindergartener, age 6. set them back 2 years they're maybe about age 4 level math. some age 3 or less. But then Gauss came up with new math theorems at about that age. Everyone is different.