High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! New Math was a brief, dramatic change in the way mathematics was taught in American grade schools, and to a lesser extent in European countries, during the 1960s. The name is commonly given to a set of teaching practices introduced in the U.S. shortly after the Sputnik crisis in order to boost science education and mathematical skill in the population so that the intellectual threat of Soviet engineers, reputedly highly skilled mathematicians, could be met.New Math emphasized mathematical structure through abstract concepts like set theory and number bases other than 10. Beginning in the early 1960s the new educational doctrine was installed, not only in the USA, but all over the developed world.