[peggyv]

I'm not sure where I should post this, so I'll start here. I have a six-year-old kindergartener who is testing at the 99.9% in math and language skills. I can help him with the language skills, but I'm clueless when it comes to math. We're considering enrolling him the Johns Hopkins University's Center for Talented Youth internet program. Do any of you have experience with this program? Do you have any other tips on how to deal with a math wiz -- from a parent's or kid's perspective? How do you feel about skipping grades?

[Dandelion]

Purchase advanced workbooks for your child. In school, he may complain that he is bored, and you may be tempted to stop your child from learning at home. This is what happened to me. Don't do this. Not only does this not work, but in the future when your son begins to compete in math competitions, he will be at a disadvantage. Perhaps your child's teachers can help him individualy. Older students are even better at offering support. But don't push your son too hard, he will only resent it. Instead let him have fun doing math, like I do. Good luck! Even if your not that good at math, you should still be able to help him for a number of years.

[akatookey]

And by the time you cant help him...he can use this site!

[andy17null]

I higly recommend the Johns Hopkins programs. My parents used their distance education program for math while I was homeschooled, and I ended up doing algebra in 5th grade . Yeah. If you don't use the distance ed, use something extracurricular. Good luck...



-Isaac

[Naga]

About skipping grades.. I think it's OK if your child is born before the end of the year. My second one is an October kid. And he is doing fine. Though my older is a May child, he was forced to skip a grade because while he was given advanced curriculum in language arts and Math in the second grade, the third grade teachers refused to do the same. He is doing fine but I am not very happy with him being so much younger than the rest.

If your school allows to advance your child's curriculum, make sure that it will be supported all the way through. The school agreed to give my younger one 5th grade math in the 4th grade. I got a committment from the principal and the 5th grade teachers that they will support advanced curriculum when he moves to the 5th. We did not have the experience to do this with the first.

I am from KS too.

[cellular_mem]

More on skipping grades. . .

I feel that people (teachers, school psychologists, etc) tend to overestimate the impact of age difference on social interactions. It's not as if being 12 automatically means you are best suited to interact with other 12 year olds.

I was skipped a grade in primary school and then took above grade level course work in middle school. Luckilly, I attended a school that regularly practiced this sort of acceleration. The teaching staff was prepared for problems arising from age differences. The school also boasted a number of "8th grade" math classes composed entirelly of 6th and 7th graders.

The ability of a child to adapt to skipping one or multiple grades is dependent upon his/her disposition and the disposition of teachers/administrators. Teachers can be downright hostile to parents (and their children) if they believe a parent is challenging some cherished educational dogma.

[gauss202]

I think that children should be placed in the classes that are most appropriate to challenge them, but also where they can learn and feel successful. Social interactions can be hard regardless of grade level and age differences. Anything within two years of their peers' tends not to be too big of a difference, especially if they stay in classes with them all along. It's more the stigma of being "advanced" that causes isolation in most cases. It really depends on the childs individual personality though, and on how common this sort of thing is at the school.

It goes without saying though, to just be supportive and encouraging of whatever your childs interests may be. The best way to encourage a child is lead them to interesting books on whatever they may be interested in. As they get older, a mentor of some type can be really helpful also -- maybe a friend or relative with a forte in that subject that they can talk to and learn from from time to time.

I have heard good things about the John's Hopkins Program but I don't know anything about it first hand. I can't see any harm in looking into it though. I find it useful on many levels not to refer to children too often as gifted or talented though. It reinforces the idea that things should always come easily to them - which is not the case. You want to reinforce that things come to those who have a passion for knowledge and who apply themselves. That no matter how much you know, there is always more out there. There is always another level of knowledge and understanding. I think that is an important psychological impression to make on them early.

[tokenadult]

Peggyv asked,

Quote:

I'm not sure where I should post this, so I'll start here. I have a six-year-old kindergartener who is testing at the 99.9% in math and language skills. I can help him with the language skills, but I'm clueless when it comes to math. We're considering enrolling him the Johns Hopkins University's Center for Talented Youth internet program. Do any of you have experience with this program? Do you have any other tips on how to deal with a math wiz -- from a parent's or kid's perspective? How do you feel about skipping grades?

Here is a FAQ file for parents who think their children are advanced in math. I'm a Chinese major myself, so I can take care of the verbal side of my son's education, but I have been researching math education for the past few years because of my oldest son's strong interest in math.

Here are suggestions for parents whose children who appear to be bright at a young age in math.

Suggestion 1: Run, don't walk, to get and read a copy of Liping Ma's book Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics. You can request it by interlibrary loan if it is not in your local library. Ma's book makes apparent what kind of foundation is necessary at the beginning for a child to go "as high as he can go" in math. Try solving the teaching problems in that book for yourself, and you'll see what I mean.

Suggestion 2: LOOK UP some of the research Professor Tony Gardiner in Britain is doing comparing acceleration to enrichment as a strategy for preparing bright children for advanced study of mathematics. See, for example,

http://www.m-a.org.uk/association/presi ... _students/

(Gardiner's definitive article on the subject is not on the Web, alas, and no longer in print.) Gardiner has shown what he means in a series of books called Maths Challenge published in Britain

http://www.singaporemath.com/supplement ... er%20Order

which I have bought and which are full of problems to develop a STRONG understanding of math. The Maths Challenge books are designed by Gardiner for seventh-graders and older students who are in the top 10 percent of the British population--younger students with good preparation could start using them at a younger age.

Suggestion 3: Surf over to Professor Hung-hsi Wu's Web site

http://math.berkeley.edu/~wu/

and make sure to download and read the draft chapters "Whole Numbers (Draft)" and "Fractions (Draft)" to get more than 100 pages each on those "easy" subjects from a thoughtful mathematician with a deep interest in math education. Then read his "How to Prepare Students for Algebra" for more insights.

Suggestion 4: Get and read the book Concepts of Modern Mathematics by Ian Stewart. If your child is an advanced reader that book might be readable by your child solo. This will show you what your child will be thinking about if he or she takes university-level math courses.

Suggestion 5: Get and read How to Teach Mathematics (2nd edition, 1999) by Steven G. Krantz, which is a book pertaining mostly to university-level math study, but with some interesting comments by Krantz on the Saxon math program and on other topics. The book includes essays by other professors of mathematics. Think about what kind of primary and secondary mathematics education (an issue Krantz hardly addresses in his book) would be fit preparation for university study of mathematics.

Suggestion 6: Having done the above, ponder what materials you are using for primary instruction in mathematics. My top recommendation for a first mathematics program is Miquon Math,

http://www.sonlight.com/miquon.html

http://www.keypress.com/catalog/product ... iquon.html

a program designed for use over three years that covers almost all of elementary school mathematics from a higher math perspective. For people who have already gone through early elementary math, my number-one recommendation is the Singapore Primary Mathematics series

http://www.sonlight.com/singapore.html

http://www.singaporemath.com/primary_ma ... cs%20Order

which is described by many mathematicians as the "best mathematics textbook series available in English," an accurate description. The Singapore Primary Mathematics series is followed by other series from Singapore that take a learner up to all the mathematics needed for A level examinations in the British university entrance system.

Sometimes these two programs, Miquon and Singapore, contain problems that are confusing to American parents who had more conventional math instruction. My friendly suggestion is to take the confusing parts of those books as learning opportunities. Mathematicians linger and ask "why?" and an alternative representation of a mathematical operation (and you can count on the Primary Mathematics series to have ACCURATE representations of mathematical operations in visual, verbal, and other forms) is an opportunity to THINK about why the content was presented that way. Sure, not every child "gets" the content first from the same kind of presentation, but knowing why all the presentations relate to the same idea is part of understanding mathematics thoroughly.

Many of the illustrations in the Singapore books show examples of manipulatives that could be used in the classroom or at home as a first introduction to a topic. In my house, we USUALLY just went straight to the book, figuring our real life and earlier use of Miquon Math had already provided the "concrete" examples that fit into the Singapore "concrete --> pictorial --> abstract" model of instruction. But the concrete examples are latent in the coursebook (for example, baking cookies, inviting guests to parties, etc.) and may be helpful for many learners.

The Education Program for Gifted Youth (EPGY)

http://epgy.stanford.edu

mathematics program is probably wholly unnecessary at the very earliest age level, but it is a great way to move ahead for young people who like that kind of computer-based instruction, especially beginning at about the fourth- or fifth-grade level. EPGY can take learners all the way up to university-level math at their own pace. The ALEKS online program

http://www.aleks.com/

is a useful supplement to any of the other recommended programs, being almost as good as and a lot less expensive than EPGY, with a fairly complete K-12 mathematics sequence but not continuing to advanced undergraduate mathematics.

Many parents have tried out many other kinds of math programs to help their precocious math learners move ahead with a good foundation. Math programs that I personally do NOT recommend, based on the desirability of a) truly challenging word problems, b) multiple representations of mathematical ideas, and c) clear, CORRECT explanations of mathematical concepts include 1) Saxon Math, 2) Math-U-See, 3) any old, traditional program (e.g., A Beka), 4) exclusive use of "gifted learner" worksheet books or other books that consist mostly of exercise sets, or 5) any "reform" math program used in United States public schools, although the best of these are better than some of the other programs I don't recommend. These negative recommendations are not intended to offend any parent who has used these programs in a good-faith belief that they are useful math programs, but are mentioned to suggest trying out the truly superior programs if you haven't done so already.

The very best mathematics textbook series in the world, as best I can ascertain, is the Hua Loo-keng School Mathematics Textbook series published in China. I may have to turn that series into English to give American students an opportunity to learn from the very best. The Hua Loo-keng series makes the curriculum expectations of the EPGY series look like slow learner expectations. The Hua Loo-keng School series doesn't just go faster but also deeper.

Suggestion 7: Get involved in "competition culture" for a reality check on how your child is doing in math. There is a great variety of mathematics competition programs these days, unlike the days when I went to school, with many programs of differing characteristics. See what local math competitions there are in your area, and what the requirements are for forming a team or joining as an individual. The American Mathematics Competition programs

http://www.unl.edu/amc/

are readily available worldwide and start at the prealgebra level and go up to qualifying tests for the International Mathematics Olympiad. The better math competitions (MATHCOUNTS

http://www.mathcounts.org/

is also in this category) are an excellent reality check on how much math your child knows as second nature.

Suggestion 8: The talent search tests

http://www.ditd.org/Cybersource/record. ... &stype=110

http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/talent_search.htm

are another way to get a reality check on a child's math level. The talent search tests are typically a standardized achievement test normed for one age group and given to a younger age group. Most of the regional talent search centers will give you DETAILED information about where your child stands in test performance ranking compared to other children who show up to take the test. The tests vary in format, and thus check whether your curriculum is developing a well-rounded approach to solving (simple) mathematical problems.

Suggestion 9: The Art of Problem Solving Web (AoPS) site

http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/

includes a treasure trove of resources for young math learners, and has long been the online home of this FAQ. The online forum is a great way for young people with interest in math to meet one another and improve their skills. There are many helpful articles on AoPS as well.

Hope this helps! Best wishes to your child.

[End of FAQ]

[confuted]

I'm not sure how young your son is, but you could play some simple number games with him occasionally. He'll learn basic math without really realizing it... just randomly ask him things like "if I had two apples, and then you gave me three more apples, how many apples would I have?" If he's tolerant enough for it, you could also try flash cards. But I'm sure you know addition through multiplication enough that you can teach him that stuff without much difficulty as fast as he is ready for it. If you don't know basic algebra, you could probably learn it fairly easily by reading a book or two, and then you could teach him that too. Oh, and throw in stuff like how to find the area of simple shapes in some creative way too. If you can succeed in teaching him all that stuff at a fairly early age, he'll have a great start and you/he should be able to figure out where to go from there without much difficulty. I learned algebra "officially" in seventh grade in our advanced program, but I had done a lot of it earlier because I was ready for it. We did a little bit of right angle trig in sixth grade, and my parents had told me very basic things about variables. Programming also helped with the concept of variables, because they are used all the time. TI-Basic for the calculator and QBasic for the computer were not beyond the capabilities of my friends and I to understand in fourth and fifth grade, and programming is great for thinking logically. If he shows an interest in computers, you may want to consider introducing him to programming as well. I would not suggest C, C++, or Java until he was older since they are far more advanced and difficult to use, and would not suggest any other programming language unless he shows a true interest. Feel free to contact me if you want more information about getting a kid started in programming, because it isn't exactly something a lot of people know how to start. Personally, I asked my dad how programs were made and he handed me a book, telling me that he hadn't read it because he didn't understand it. I read the book and the help files, and had a go at programming Anyway, I hope I've been of help.