How is your child 2 grades ahead in math

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids were two grades ahead and one was a year ahead. We did nothing. Some kids just are naturally good at it and others are naturally good at other things.

This makes no sense to me. If your kid is just doing math at school and nothing else, and they all follow the grade level curriculum, then they would stay at that level because they wouldn’t be exposed to harder math concepts and problems. They must get it from somewhere, either an online program, workbooks. If school offers different levels of math, then that’s not doing nothing imo.

[Anonymous]

This really depends on what age and grade you’re talking about. Mine is in 2nd and is doing 4th grade math. Which sounds impressive sure, until you realize this just means he can add and subtract 3 and 4 digit numbers instead of 1 and 2 digit numbers, and can multiply/divide singles. He knows area, perimeter, and large numbers which are all easily picked up. And he knows about money and how to make change, but only because he actually gets a cash allowance and buys things with cash. He can use a ruler and watch, practical life tools. I’m sure all of the above is normal and expected of average children in many other countries.

It’s more impressive if you talking about a 7th grader completing Algebra and Geometry before 8th. I’m not sure what kids do between 4th-6th to make this happen. Math at our school is mind numbingly slow. 2nd grade math was just a review of 1st grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In elementary school he became obsessed with Prodigy. Really wanted to win those monsters. When two of his friends started playing with him, he got even more into it. It gave him incredibly fast calculation skills which allowed him to easily pick up the more abstract problem solving behind math.

In high school, math was incredibly easy for him. One group of his friends including a girl he liked were planning on taking AP Physics and Calculus the next year WTH him. They were all taking a community college non credit course in Calculus that summer. He decided to do it with them. While he regretted signing up while he was in the class because why would anyone want to wake up early five days a week during the summer and spend 3 hours doing Calculus, he was really relieved the next fall. He said he understood now why some kids find it those classes easy and others really struggle. He noticed that his prior high school classes hadn’t prepared him for either class but the summer one did. He’s a nice kid and spent a lot of hours tutoring friends and other students who hadn’t already taken the course.

Prodigy was crap for our kids in the 2010s. I personally observed the same question being asked multiple times as my son returned again and again to take on a boss. My smart kid eventually memorized answers without mastering the calculations. I asked him to demonstrate similar made up on the spot problems and he couldn't. I was very frustrated they were given math class time to do this game.

[Anonymous]

I did workbooks in elemetary school, taught math facts, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids were two grades ahead and one was a year ahead. We did nothing. Some kids just are naturally good at it and others are naturally good at other things.

This makes no sense to me. If your kid is just doing math at school and nothing else, and they all follow the grade level curriculum, then they would stay at that level because they wouldn’t be exposed to harder math concepts and problems. They must get it from somewhere, either an online program, workbooks. If school offers different levels of math, then that’s not doing nothing imo.

I posted above that my kid listened to his brother’s tutoring sessions, and then we added Beast Academy, so my kid isn’t really a “did nothing” kid. But earlier than that he also figured out a lot from just life around him. So, he figured out regrouping from playing monopoly, or he learned about measurement from cooking, or he figured out about time by following our schedule and paying attention. In the early years that was enough that he would have tested ahead although we didn’t do any testing, so when the tutoring thing happened when he was in 4th he was in a good position to make sense of the prealgebra he was eavesdropping on.

His brother who is a smart kid but not an intuitive mathematician grew up in the same house and played monopoly and cooked and followed a schedule and was still very much on grade level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mine had a weird interest in math since very young age - like definitely by 3 wanted to do math problems. Did beast academy in 2nd grade, occasionally, online. In third he is allowed to use school IXL website that allows him to go as far ahead as needed and he just surged ahead. We also started RSM this year as he was losing his mind with school math, but in RSM he does grade level math (though what RSM considers grade level and what DCPS considers grade level is quite different).

Mine is similar. He always scored 99th percentile in math, had the highest math scores in his elementary school. He started RSM in 6th grade because he lives doing math and wanted more of a challenge

[Anonymous]

We enrolled DS is RSm in 3rd grade after he started playing with different bases for fun. He had a lesson in his pull out at school that effectively taught about using different bases for a problem. He was excited to tell us about it. My DH talked to him about what a base is and then started walking through problems using different bases. DS loved it. We started with RSMs grade level class and he tested into the math competition class. DS has participated in math competitions and enjoyed the math competition classes ever since.

He just likes math and wants to take the classes, so we let him.

[Anonymous]

Mine has always had an interest in math, and an innate ability to understand it. We've never pushed it or enrolled him in outside programs like Russian Math (we asked if he wanted to do it and he said no). DS is in high school now and is a year ahead in math (class-wise) but is probably further along because he explores math topics on his own outside of school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It doesn't take much to get a kid 2+ years ahead in math in early ES. The curriculum is slow and repetitive. So a kid who is interested in and exposed to math can progress really fast. We didn't do anything other than play math games and talk about math concepts when my oldest was little. His school then put him into independent learning with adaptive software and that really pushed him many years beyond ahead of the curriculum.

Which software?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My child attends public school and has many classmates that are 2 years (or more) ahead in math.

Did your child get there because you personally tutored them, or did they go to something like AOPS or Russian School of math to get ahead several grade levels?

Most kids who are 2 (and especially more than 2) years ahead don’t need to be “tutored”. They see it and they understand.

What a bizarre comment. Any student who isn't tutored is not stretching their potential into difficult topics.

That’s not true. The very top math students have a knack for math and will do fine without any tutors.

Those students can do much, much more than "fine" with the right support. We all do them a disservice if we set "fine" as the standard for them, as they then never develop the discipline and emotional skills to cope with doing math that actually challenges them, which leads to them struggling in college or grad school.

[Anonymous]

With DD who is two years ahead and was always super bored in math until HS - we did some numbers play (dice games) with her when little and let her play prodigy on the iPad when in ES. Think it helped with exposure but also just think math clicks well for some kids.

[Anonymous]

DP. We see elementary and middle school aged kids from both local public and private schools going into or walking out from Kumon or Mathnasium all the time. The Kumon in North Arlington near 29 stays busy all year. It is easy to match the student with their school sticker on the car as they enter or leave. Friends in N Potomac tell us they see the same pattern across the river.

I am not saying every smart math kid has been tutored outside school, but it is very clear that many in/near the DC beltway were tutored outside school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It doesn't take much to get a kid 2+ years ahead in math in early ES. The curriculum is slow and repetitive. So a kid who is interested in and exposed to math can progress really fast. We didn't do anything other than play math games and talk about math concepts when my oldest was little. His school then put him into independent learning with adaptive software and that really pushed him many years beyond ahead of the curriculum.

Which software?

I-ready in K and then they added Prodigy in 1st. I hated them both for various reasons. He's now doing Beast Academy in 3rd.

[Anonymous]

The accelerated math pathway in MCPS puts students 2 years ahead in math. They leave ES having completed math 6, then get through math 8 in 6th, and take algebra 1 in 7th. In common core algebra 1 is in 9th, so that is 2 years ahead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Two of my kids were two grades ahead and one was a year ahead. We did nothing. Some kids just are naturally good at it and others are naturally good at other things.

This makes no sense to me. If your kid is just doing math at school and nothing else, and they all follow the grade level curriculum, then they would stay at that level because they wouldn’t be exposed to harder math concepts and problems. They must get it from somewhere, either an online program, workbooks. If school offers different levels of math, then that’s not doing nothing imo.

Some kids can just look at math they haven’t seen before and know what to do. My
Kid’s kindergarten teacher remarked that she just kept going deeper with and he always knew what to do. He’s still like that. I barely passed algebra II