The Maintenance of Fundamental Arithmetical Skills in the Junior High School

Abstract

One underlying assumption of this paper should be stated at the outset in order that the development of the subject may be more readily followed, and in order that those who find themselves unable to agree with this assumption may at once reject any conclusions which may be drawn. That assumption is that arithmetic skills are worth acquiring because of their usefulness in life. Our hypothesis does not necessarily deny the existence of any disciplinary values in arithmetic, nor does it imply a quarrel with those who hold the “rich-present-life-for-the-child” theory of education. It merely insists that one reason for teaching the fundamental skills of arithmetic in the elementary school is that it is the duty of the school to contribute to the future social and civic usefulness and to the happiness, convenience and comfort of the individual by creating in him during the elementary school period the ability to perform accurately and with reasonable dispatch those arithmetical computations which life demands.