One cannot intuit until one knows the territory. Intuition is what the good students will develop by the time they get to "upper level math". And they develop

One cannot intuit until one knows the territory. Intuition is what the good students will develop by the time they get to "upper level math". And they develop it by seeing and solving a lot of math problems step by step. The "hard way" is not as fast as intuition, but it has a set of instructions that can be taught and followed. You cannot just tell the students in first grade: you don't need to follow any instructions, just start intuiting the answers by looking at the big picture. What you call "the hard way" is the way people have learned addition for a thousand years, and it works. It worked for Newton, Einstein, and the guys who put men on the moon. Aside: The day I see a Millennial kid make change from a cash register without having to look at the computer screen is the day I might start taking math education advice from your generation... Aside #2: I too did an image search for 'common core math'. Look what I found! I think they make my point for me: http://i1.wp.com/truthinamericaneducation.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Common-Core_13.jpg http://i1.wp.com/truthinamericaneducation.com/wp-content/upl... http://greenecountyteaparty.ohlc.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/30/2014/03/Common-Core-math-problem.png http://greenecountyteaparty.ohlc.org/wp-content/uploads/site...