All of this is IMO, and I'm going to disagree somewhat with previous posters.
As a systems engineer, I semi-regularly find myself providing mathy explanations to non-mathy business unit representatives. My personal definition of mathematics is that it's a language that describes relationships. Relationships of what? It's all a bunch of abstract principles unconnected to reality (which is why the ancient philosophers found them so beautiful). We have to connect those principles to our particular real-world applications via English, or another language of choice.
So, are they correct in saying it's important to be able to express mathematics in a wordy, English-oriented way? Yes.
Is Everyday Math the way to go about it? Absolutely not. EM has other egregious problems (spiraling and insisting every student learn and master 8 different ways to perform the same simple operation) apart from its language element, but even the language element is flawed, due to overemphasis during very early, simplistic math operations. Give the kids one or two problems at the end of the assignment where they have to write out an answer, then ramp that up when they get to something more complex, like Algebra.
This. To add to what Polarbear and Val (and so many others) have already said.
It's not like I need to "explain" how I've written something in, say....
Spanish, right? I only need to do that if I am translating it for someone who does not Habla Espanol. Same thing here. EM
only teaches students "how to explain basic math to people who have no idea how to use either hand OR the provided flashlight."
Ahem.
