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Harold W. Horowitz, MD
Valhalla, NY

JAMA. 1998;280:765.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

Between seeing patients, performing administrative duties, and writing papers, I don't often have time for epiphanies. However, just recently I had one. It started with that age-old problem that parents of young children dread: homework.

My son Azra and I were working on a set of second-grade addition problems. His school uses the Chicago System for teaching mathematics. I am told this method is problem-solving–oriented compared with the traditional rote learning of arithmetic that many of us grew up with. The system has its own set of intrinsic rules that few but the initiated understand. I'm sure it leaves many parents in the dark, despite the nearly nightly letters from teachers explaining what the little boxes on the worksheets signify.

I was reviewing one evening's assignment with my son and was quite certain that his interpretation of a problem was not the intended one. I suggested . . . [Full Text of this Article]