Anonymous wrote:Education is a great way to spend time; an investment in the future of the family and society. It's sad that society has reached a point where OP is afraid of giving their kid a healthy upbringing.

Education includes a lot of things, like reading a paper together, visiting museums, doing experiments, attending cultural activities. It is not limited to grubbing over a workbook so your kid can be “ahead” of his classmates and feel superior

Education is a great way to spend time; an investment in the future of the family and society. It's sad that society has reached a point where OP is afraid of giving their kid a healthy upbringing.

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Anonymous wrote:We had a few teachers in grade school get upset with us for teaching our kid the times tables up through 12 until they knew them cold. Flash cards, just randomly saying, "Hey, what's 3 x 3?" 9! And on and on. Kid started third grade knowing the times tables.

The teachers teaching New Math were upset. They couldn't get our kid to draw the math anymore. Our kid would write the answer on the page and circle it. Our kid said why are you making me draw 4 x 4 when I already know the answer is 16? I'm bored with this. Kid would get 50% of a math test when the answers were all correct but got 50% taken off because weren't 16 pineapples drawn to represent the answer. Also, kid finished the math test in two minutes.

Went to a meeting where the FCPS math curriculum person said that the parents who were teaching times tables were "damaging" their child's ability to learn math.

Have fun, OP.

We did that without our kids from young ages, but they still knew how to pretend to do the work for the teachers. You need to make sure that they know how to play the game unless you want teachers taking it out on them

THIS! The child still needs to play the school game. It’s so stupid but necessary. That’s why I teach my child using illustrations and algorithms.

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Anonymous wrote:Yes, there is a downside. When you are in an area where many parents supplement math, then teachers expect the students to have already been taught the material and don't teach.

I mean a drawback on the individual level.

Having teachers who don't teach is a downside on an individual level.

One child learning math at home isn’t going to affect whether a teacher teaches math!

Then tutor your DC. And be prepared to tutor your DC for the next 11-12 years.

So true! I supplement in math at home for my 7yo. I scoped their math trajectory and I will indeed by tutoring/teaching him for at least the next 8 years. I’m an educator and I knew for absolute fact that with the exception of a gifted school setting, not a gifted program but an actual gifted school, they will not be instructed on their actual math level.

All that being said, just go into teaching math with a long range plan that includes a detailed teaching schedule, comprehensive math material/program, and someone who can actually teach the material effectively. There’s no point in a child being years ahead in math but can’t problem solve and think flexibly. Depth vs breadth.

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Anonymous wrote:Nope. I’ve supplemented with worksheets, games, and educational art projects since DD was 3. She’s only 6 now but the work has been worth it to ensure she is ready to learn, is challenged by harder material, and has fun learning. Her pre-k, k, and now first grade teachers have all said she has been ahead of the game with the curriculum and also the ability to sit quietly, do her work, and do so completely. Who knows long term but for now I call this a win.

Obviously if you teach her beforehand she is going to be ahead of the curriculum. Doesn’t mean she is anything special.

Why are some parents so afraid of letting their kids be taught in school? For some reason they have this pathological need for their kid to learn everything beforehand at home.

Because the school is not teaching at a level that motivates my child. He goes to RSM for math where new material is taught and the assignments include problems that he struggles with a bit and has to work through. He appreciates the challenge that is offered at RSM. We did not start with enrichment until he was in 3rd grade because we were hoping that the math would get to a point that it would be engaging at school but it didn’t and we were not going to continue to let him be bored in a subject that he really enjoys.

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our third grade expected them to just know the facts. No teaching of it at all. It was just expected.

This.

If parents do not supplement/enrich outside school, then a typical student will be behind classmates (and behind state SOL expectations), at least in MD and VA. Outside school supplementing on math is very very very common in APS, FCPS, and MCPS.

Teacher quality in any large school system will vary widely; many are not really teaching math facts and just expect students to know them.

Anonymous wrote:
Why are some parents so afraid of letting their kids be taught in school?

Because local public schools actually are not competent at teaching either reading or math.

Example: For reading, they use the widely discredited “whole language” / “balanced reading” methods, which do not work for about 60% of students (about 40% will learn to read regardless of the curriculum). See many threads in the DCUM education fora, WashPost editorial from last month, et alia.

Reading in VA will be improving in coming years, and many thanks to the NAACP for pressuring Fairfax and Arlington to move to a Phonics-centered reading curriculum. That will take a few years to really materialize. Our DC need to be able to read now, as they already are in elementary.

Math likely will remain poorly taught in the US for decades, sigh. Privates do much better than most publics at math, but privates still can be uneven. In FCPS and MCPS, most of the top math students learned after school, not in school, using better curricula and real worksheets for practice at home.

We have a child who at a very early age loved numbers (18 months/2 years old) He would count backwards and forwards to a hundred in several languages at those ages. He very quickly, age 3-4, grasped the basic concept of math- i.e. 5x5 is 5 fives and has used those skills to progress quickly through the math curriculum. Because he intrinsically made those connections, math up to this point has been super easy for him (now first grade). He loves big numbers and loves you to ask him math questions. He will beg us to. He enjoys doing number combinations or making up math word-type problems- like half half 16 x 4. He loves numbers and therefore math. His teacher has worked with him separately to come up with different ways to represent math problems and numbers. I think most of it, he is still fairly bored and does the work quickly but because he enjoys math, it hasn't become too much of an issue. Our worry is more than when it comes to math that is challenging, he won't know how to work to achieve mastery since it's all come so easy to him so far. No real advice other than that's been our concern and we've been open and honest with his teacher(s)/school about it. They also share the same possible concern but not much we can do until we get to that point Having our first grader do algebra really isn't the solution either.

Anonymous wrote:Nope. I’ve supplemented with worksheets, games, and educational art projects since DD was 3. She’s only 6 now but the work has been worth it to ensure she is ready to learn, is challenged by harder material, and has fun learning. Her pre-k, k, and now first grade teachers have all said she has been ahead of the game with the curriculum and also the ability to sit quietly, do her work, and do so completely. Who knows long term but for now I call this a win.

Obviously if you teach her beforehand she is going to be ahead of the curriculum. Doesn’t mean she is anything special.

Why are some parents so afraid of letting their kids be taught in school? For some reason they have this pathological need for their kid to learn everything beforehand at home.

Anonymous wrote:There's little downside to teaching reading at home, unless you are using a truly awful curriculum. But if your school is using F&P levels, they are likely already using a terrible curriculum, and it is unlikely you will pick something worse.

Same is unfortunately true with math. It's pretty dreadful most places, so working with him early helps prevent gaps in fundamental skills from arising, and from him being bored because the material is confusing.

This. No downside and LOTS of upside. We do both with our DC and will continue to reinforce and supplement.

Anonymous wrote:No he doesn’t need a home curriculum. Home should not also be school.

The problem is that there's not much school in public schools these days. You want your child to get a solid foundation of something, you have to do it yourself.

Anonymous wrote:Yes, there is a downside. When you are in an area where many parents supplement math, then teachers expect the students to have already been taught the material and don't teach.

+1. This. If peers are supplementing then you MUST supplement. It’s an arms race - particularly in MCPS

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Anonymous wrote:The downside is that your kid needs a childhood and lots of outdoor play (not organized activities, just free outdoor play) and every hour of Kumon is depriving them of that.

This would not be Kumon. I mean math activities and explaining concepts that he is asking about. Using toys as manipulatives for grouping and arrays, etc. There are also games for simple addition and subtraction and repeated addition leading into multiplication.

Get Montessori supplies. It’s the best way to learn math concepts.

Anonymous wrote:We had a few teachers in grade school get upset with us for teaching our kid the times tables up through 12 until they knew them cold. Flash cards, just randomly saying, "Hey, what's 3 x 3?" 9! And on and on. Kid started third grade knowing the times tables.

The teachers teaching New Math were upset. They couldn't get our kid to draw the math anymore. Our kid would write the answer on the page and circle it. Our kid said why are you making me draw 4 x 4 when I already know the answer is 16? I'm bored with this. Kid would get 50% of a math test when the answers were all correct but got 50% taken off because weren't 16 pineapples drawn to represent the answer. Also, kid finished the math test in two minutes.

Went to a meeting where the FCPS math curriculum person said that the parents who were teaching times tables were "damaging" their child's ability to learn math.

Have fun, OP.

our third grade expected them to just know the facts. No teaching of it at all. It was just expected.

Anonymous wrote:The downside is that your kid needs a childhood and lots of outdoor play (not organized activities, just free outdoor play) and every hour of Kumon is depriving them of that.

This would not be Kumon. I mean math activities and explaining concepts that he is asking about. Using toys as manipulatives for grouping and arrays, etc. There are also games for simple addition and subtraction and repeated addition leading into multiplication.