Chapter 8A: Kill All The Calculators?:

My mother is absolutely convinced that children who use calculators in school will never learn how to count change and will be forever condemned to work behind pictogram-keyed cash registers in fast-food outlets. She is 82 years old, still good at “figures,” and hasn’t been near a school in 60 years. Her skepticism is widely shared by others both in and out of the schools.

Mom’s conviction is rooted in her experience with store employees who have difficulty making change and answering simple questions about products in understandable English. She takes these examples as her very own personal confirmation of the decline of U.S. education that she has seen and heard about on television. Try as I may, I cannot seem to convince my own mother that this school failure has nothing to do with kids using calculators.