The Original New Math: Storytelling versus History

Abstract

The 1950s and 1960s were a lively time for mathematics education in the United States, but that era has now become sufficiently remote that many teachers have only vague or secondhand knowledge of the issues and personalities involved. The phrase “new math,” which is often used to designate the reforms of that period, has never been very informative in itself, and it continues to generate misinformed commentary. Some of this commentary has been promulgated by critics of programs and textbooks associated with the NCTM's Standards, which these critics have dubbed the “new, new math” (Gardner 1998). More confusingly still, the newer reforms themselves are sometimes called the new math; the term is used in this manner in a 1997 Newsweek article (Kantrowitz and Murr 1997) and in a 2000 opinion piece by former Secretary of Education William Bennett (Bennett 2000). The phrase may eventually detach itself entirely from the 1950s and 1960s. This article aims to help teachers better understand the original new math by examining several stories that have been told and that continue to be told about it. These stories contain outright fallacies, half-truths, and not-quitethe-whole truths, as well as indisputable facts. Understanding the nuances among these cases should help us as we continue the never-ending process of providing a better mathematics education to students.