ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses how the logic of equality embedded in the notion of mathematics for all organized certain ways to see and think about children during New Math reforms in the United States. During the period after World War II, mathematics was considered a “tool of modern life”. Including and investing in elementary mathematics in the new math reforms brought with it new ways of reasoning about how children might be seen as intelligent citizens—capable of living a modern life. The chapter examines logic of equality as a way of reasoning about and establishing what is equal, equivalent, and different through the use of the equal sign in the curriculum. It looks at the equal sign as foundational content of what elementary students should learn in reforms developed by the school mathematics study group. It seems so obvious that children’s mathematical reasoning is linked to their participation in society.
