Conceptual Understanding

In thinking about conceptual inderstanding, I bumped into the following, on "Why Long Division":
http://www.shearonforschools.com/why_long_division.htm

It contained the following:

EDUCATORS TELL US OF THE NEED FOR CONCEPTUAL UNDERSTANDING AND MATH REASONING SKILLS IN OUR STUDENTS

* These skills ARE critical in today's technological society.
* What many math educators tell us represent examples and exercises for developing these skills are NOT relevant and/or NOT correct.

MATH EDUCATORS OFTEN HAVE LIMITED KNOWLEDGE OF MATHEMATICS

* For example, three of the 14 problems originally proposed by the presidential commission on the eighth grade national mathematics text and/or the "solutions" they gave were INCORRECT. This commission included many of the best known math education experts in the country.