Recall Everyday Math in Long Valley NJ

I get very fired up when ever I think of any child learning the lattice of multiplication. In one of my my more memorable board of ed campaign posts called Do You Know What Algorithms Your Kids Are Learning? I provided a pretty good example of what’s wrong with Everyday Math. It isn’t that everything about Everyday Math is a waste, but one of their marketing gimmicks in it is when they introduce methods like this piece of garbage that actually lengthens your kid’s work time besides making them seem utterly ridiculous for using arts and crafts to solve a multiplication problem. The lattice method is impossible to do in your head and does nothing more than hamper your kid’s ability to compete in the work place.

According to Wikipedia it was introduced in Europe in 1202. Hmmm 1202? That sounds like a long time ago right? I wonder why people that invented the computer didn’t use it? Did Albert Einstein use it? How about Larry and Sergey? Why didn’t they use it when they invented Google? How about getting a man on the moon? Didn’t NASA use the lattice method? Obviously not. The same wikipedia article writes that computers that use a base 2 number system use the standard multiplication method.

Imagine tomorrow you are in a meeting and you need to multiply two numbers together. You and your colleagues don’t have laptops or calculators on you; you have your cell phone but you don’t want to pull it out. All you have is pencil and paper and you need to multiply 345×12. You could

1. Multiply it using the standard algorithm which you learned in elementary school
2. Multiply in your head 345×10, 345×2, and then add the results together
3. or draw pictures that look like this:

While you are still drawing your boxes and lines your co-workers will have figured out the right answer and had enough time to laugh you out of the office.

The lattice method is a perfect example of what’s wrong with Everyday Math. It is a gimmick that has been around for over 800 years and we don’t need it. The tried and true standard method works every time and is far more efficient. If Everyday Math is such a good curriculum than why don’t they go ahead and teach the most efficient method and give kids a choice? Why should a child have to learn this long method of using arts and crafts to figure out a simple math problem? They should NEVER have to learn the lattice method of multiplication but Everyday Math needs gimmicks to sell books.  The Lattice Method should be Exhibit A as to why this needs to be recalled from our schools.

Eric