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 Base two -- to the programmers, Star Trek geeks, and nerds of the world -- is also called "binary," the mathematics of computers. Even if you don’t understand computers, binary math exists in most every way the computer runs. Heck, downloading and reading this page is a feat of binary mathematics. Not a feat of humor or intelligence, but a feat nonetheless. What I’m learning here is nothing more than that schools were preparing children to program computers. Going back a bit – in the introduction, the pamphlet says, "Math has changed just as much as history, geography, or the sciences. For example, electronic computers were now available. Why, then, should students do extensive work on logarithms when the computer could easily do the job?" Why indeed – especially since mathematics had changed from memorizing the steps to analyzing the process. The student needn’t memorize the math tables, provided their able to tell a computer what order to do the mathematic operation. Sets, Cartesian mathematics, binary operations – it’s all the means for figuring out how data relates to itself.  And we wonder why kids these days grasp computers so quickly, while Grandpa needs help running the one-touch microwave oven and the exchange students excel at Math Bowls. Someone had the foresight, with great American gusto, to say, "why teach it to the kids when a machine does it faster – just teach them how to use the machine!" My god, my blood runs Red, White, and Blue just typing that sentence. While the official use of New Math didn’t last very long, ending around the time I started school, I know it’s influences were still felt. The emphasis on understanding place value, the concepts of number combinations, they were all present in my early education, along with memorization of number tables and doing pages and pages of math problems as homework.  Now, as I help my daughter with her math homework, I’ve noticed a lot more use of sets in the form of monetary units, calculating on number lines, and complex story problems, than I had. The sudden revolutionary introduction of New Math shook up the education ideals of people forty years ago, but it’s still here, burrowing into homework still today. While I don’t understand the instructions on my daughter’s homework all the time, it’s nice to know that she’ll be around to show me how to run my home electronics twenty years from now. In the words of Tom Lehrer,
Hooray for new math, 
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