Ten minutes to write. Less time to read.

Recently the thought for the week on my web site asked, “Does anybody remember how to do long division without a calculator?” Nobody actually responded to this question, so I’m drawing my own conclusions. And the truth is I think there are many of us out there who do indeed remember learning how to do long division and then dreading the homework that followed.

Long division introduced itself to me around fourth grade. It came after intense study of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and the multiplication tables. I went to a school that was big on memorization and we spent weeks learning about two times two, five times five, and ten times ten. We learned every combination in-between too, forwards and backwards. Little did I realize we were being prepped for that most difficult of basic math functions: gozinta. That’s what we called long division back then.

When we finally began our study of LD, we started with simple problems, like three gozinta twelve how many times? But this exercise soon blossomed into problems where the numbers were much larger and there were remainders. It often took half a sheet of paper to demonstrate the answer.

Today, calculators do the entire thing. You just plug in the numbers and wait for the answer. There is no mental math involved. There is no emphasis on memorization or the time-honored multiplication tables. Instead, the focus seems to be on how to master a mechanical tool that does the work for us.

By doing this, we’re not teaching our children mathematical capability; rather, we’re teaching them how to use a calculator to find the answer. It’s mechanical manipulation over mathematical reasoning. The answer is the same, but the process has definitely changed.

Do I think calculators are bad? No. I think they have their place, but it definitely falls in line behind teaching children the basics of math. Once somebody has mastered them, I have no problem with that person taking a short cut. It’s only when the shortcut becomes the honored way of thinking that I wonder about our mental acuity.