Hi Lzp11,
Welcome to the discussion, as you’ve seen, I don’t mind shooting off my mouth a bit. Hopefully you’ve seen Dr. Robinson’s video. One of the most important points to get from that is to not let the schools dictate the educational schedule for your kids, simply because they’ve been dumbing down for decades now, but kids are not getting any dumber (i.e., the dumbing down is political, part of the child-centered trend in society). I’ll post a few comments to your posting now:
“I have been ‘lurking’ and following this thread with great interest since the beginning. Thank you Robert for all your insights. One of the main impacts on me has been to make me better able to understand the need to prioritize maths and make choices about future education. I am based in the UK so don’t follow all of the discussions about US curriculae though.”
I love having people from all corners of the world on this thread (or, at least the English-speaking world). Feel free to ask questions then. I know from reading UK newspapers that terminology is often different over there. But since you understand the need for math being a priority, you are where you need to be.
“I was really interested to read of the 20 hours a week that you devoted to maths. This makes a lot of sense to me following the 10,000 hours to reach expertise rule from many different sources, which would suggest that at this rate it would take about 10 years to become an expert in maths - it sounds like that roughly is a match for your journey? Would you agree?”
I don’t agree with the hard number, at least in math, because much of time in math is spent reviewing and testing (and doing problems slow, because of having to go back), maybe half of the time. With David going so fast through Saxon (he covered 4 grade levels in his first year), he didn’t need to review (so I skipped the early sections in each book), and I didn’t need to test, because I treated every section as a test. He would do the section, I would mark it up, and then he’d go back and fix his mistakes, every time (and every, single, problem). Saxon’s method, if used fast and thoroughly, takes care of the need for review and testing. So with that out of the way, maybe something like a formula would work for the number of hours - something like: Number of hours necessary = 50,000/(number of hours per week). So if you spent 20 hours a week, you’ll have it mastered in 2,500 hours, and if 10 hours a week, maybe 5,000 hours. Something like that, but maybe not quite as steep. I also think with Saxon, that 10,000 hours is way too long, as that would imply something like 7 hours per section for the entire series. Now working on cars, or especially doing plumbing, or plasma physics, yes, I can see the need for 10,000 hours to be a master.
“I’m interested on your take on other curriculae that are available. It strikes me that 10,000 hours on any half decent curriculum in maths (or anything else) is likely to take most people to a pretty high level. Do you have any opinion on approaches such as Singapore math (where they have a far higher achievement in math across the whole population compared to most other countries) or Rightstart, for example?”
Don’t know Rightstart, but l’ve also heard good things about Singapore Math. My general rules for a good math book is the following:
- Black and white (no need for color)
- No calculators (or very, very, little calculator work, as in Saxon)
- 3 authors at most (typical textbooks have 60 or so now)
- No diversity reviewer approval
- Likewise no pictures of Nelson Mandela
- No fancy new approaches to solving problems (i.e., Lattice Method for division)
I put the Nelson Mandela quip in there because I saw a textbook with his picture. He actually is a hero of mine, being willing to stay in jail rather for his cause, for decades, while the South African government was willing to release him (I think based on him leaving the country). But I don’t remember him coming up with any great mathematical achievements.
“I can see that Saxon has worked fantastically well for you, so I understand why you would advocate this as one of the best routes to follow. I’m wondering if it is a less good fit for some children, whether you see it as a stand alone choice or one of many possible good options.”
I think it’s the best, not based on my one case, but based on many, many other examples, starting with its popularity with home schoolers (who have no political agenda). To answer your question, back when Saxon was independent, they had a page of anecdotes on their website. One of my favorites was a public school where they gave the old, beat-up, worn-out Saxon books to the students who were in the “average” math level, and gave new cutting-edge math books to the honor’s math class. Needless to say, those “average” students ran circles around the honor’s students at the end of the year, when they were all tested. While one can never promise individual results, I think the best chance for success is with Saxon…now you just have to find a way to get your hands on it, over there.
“I like the way that you raise these issues so clearly and eloquently. My oldest is 3.8 years and not quite rady for following a formal curriculum although we do a lot of preparation and maths development work using various materials including different types of abacus. Like you as she gets older I will be afterschooling her and I can see that the reality is that there is limited time to do music, sport, maths, reading, languages etc etc. So there are some hard choices to be made. Like Manda and Tamsyn, I also place value on some non-maths subjects (music in particular) and sport / exercise is to me an essential part of a healthy lifestyle. So I think we will struggle to find 20 hours for math (I hear you sigh and shake your head disapprovingly LOL !!!).”
No, not 20. And (this won’t go over with the feminist crowd too well, but what the heck), I always wonder if I would have gone slower if David was a girl. The idea of having a little girl that’s 11 years old starting in college would have scared me a lot more than David, and I would have worried a lot about her social development. So you can do less…just don’t get to the point where you’re doing it in your “spare time”, because, if nothing else, your school will take care of filling up that time.
“I do have a rationale though. Many careers also place a high value on a range of skills and expertise and I would like to equip my children to have both academic, communication, leadership and other skills for their future lives. For example, in my field (medicine) it is essential to have a very broad range of these and to be able to demonstrate them on a CV for admission to university as well as the requisite academic requirements.”
I think that much of the other stuff you mention is just good parenting and comes over time, not something that you have to do 10 hours a week when the kid is young. I didn’t care about any of that. I did care that my kid understood that he was NOT anything special…he was just an average kid that had math forced on him early (and yes, he thanks me nearly every day now, especially for being able to skip high school). I made damn sure that he never denigrated anyone below him academically (except jokingly, as he would call Dr. Robinson’s kids slackers for not finishing Calculus until age 15).
“However, where we can hopefully agree is that maths is super-important to focus on, starting from early in the child’s education, and that if we are to choose academic subjects to pay attention to, then this is the big area to go for. This is the one message I have taken from this thread. We will aim for 10 hours. I hope this is achievable.”
It is achievable, as a kid has at least 40 hours of awake time outside of school every week. It’s only a question of priority. If the kid doesn’t make 10 hours of Saxon, it’s because other things are more important to the parent, that simple (sorry, but 10 hours is about my minimum).
“I’m interested in your comment about the importance of learning to read (I agree). Once a child can read (which does not necessarily take a long time, especially if starting early as many of us have done here), then what do you see as the next steps?”
In my case, not much. We had David initially reading at just about exactly your oldest kid’s age (3.8 years). From there we read tougher books, and then finally, I had him read Hamlet to me, with the proper punctuation and play-acting (really just voicing) the roles, so he would sound like a woman with Ophelia and sound scary when the Ghost showed up. It was fun, but that was the end of my instruction (about 4.2 years old) - there was nothing more that I could teach him. I figured the grammar and other stuff would get filled in at school, and that worked out. The key is simply being able to read, because The System’s method is designed to fail the kids (i.e., Sight Words through third grade, and only then phonics). Other stuff like comprehension isn’t can’t be taught, it comes over time (but being able to read first certainly helps!), and spelling was a breeze for him, I think because he learned to read properly. We never did one spelling lesson, other than study for spelling bees, which we won handily.
“Do you mean learning to read is the process of systematically learning to decode words using phonics instruction or do you also refer to the later skills of increasing fluency in reading more complex text, fictional and non-fiction etc?”
LEARNING to reading is exactly what you said, systemically decoding the English language using phonics. Everyone eventually does that (if they learn to read), it’s only a question of when those connections are made. If made as a 3 or 4 years old, then the kid is set for life. If delayed by Sight Words until the kid is 10 years old, he will struggle, no different than trying to learn a second language as an adult. In between the results are likely on a sliding scale. The stuff after that will come as the kid picks up vocabulary and context, so I didn’t worry about that at all, and I was right.
since your back again ( I know you missed us 
)
time to adjust the rules and expectations a little. :yes: