Abacuses are still used extensively in many Asian countries.

Should abacuses be allowed on tests?

What calculators are allowed on ACT? SAT?

Wall Street Journal, Dec. 17, 1996
Why Our Kids Can't Do Math

"When our daughter went to public school, she came home spouting off about Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain `persons.' She taught us that Christopher Columbus was even more evil than researchers who use bunnies to test eyeliner.

"We learned to live with her gimmicky curriculum. But then, one evening when she was in eighth grade, I saw her using a calculator to compute ten percent of 470. Later I had to explain to her that one-fourth is the same as 25 percent. I asked her, `Are the other kids this dumb?' My straight-A child reassured me: `Oh, they're much dumber.'"

Newsweek, Nov. 3, 1997
Ditch The Calculators

"I sigh inwardly as I watch yet another student, this one a ninth grader, struggle with an advanced math problem that requires simple multiplication. He mentally grapples with 5•6, looks longingly at the off-limits calculator on the corner of my desk and finally guesses the answer: `35.'" ...

"When youngsters use a calculator to solve 9•4 in third grade, they're still using one to solve the same problem in high school. By then they are also contending with algebra. Because they never felt comfortable working with numbers as children, they are seriously disadvantaged when they attempt the generalized math of algebra."

Newsweek, Dec. 15, 1997
Subtracting the New Math

California fourth graders will now be expected to master long division on paper.

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