Deferred Arithmetic
In this discussion I wish to differentiate between two aspects of the content of the arithmetic curriculum. One aspect may be designated as social arithmetic, which includes those learning experiences whose primary purpose it is to help the pupils to understand the functions and applications of numbers in the affairs of their daily lives and in activities of the community. In these activities the emphasis is on adding meaning and significance to is on adding meaning and significance to experience rather than on teaching pupils how to manipulate number processes. The other aspect of arithmetic may be designated as computational arithmetic. In this work the primary purpose is to present the number facts and processes in a systematic way for the purpose of developing skill in computation and number manipulation. In the ideal program these two aspects of arithmetic, the social and the computational, should supplement each other. However, it is commonly recognized today that in the past the tendency has clearly been to over-emphasize the formal computational aspect of the subject and to place relatively little stress on the social-informational functions of the subject.