All About Abacus Training

[ChiefKiasu]

A lot of people, especially those without kids, think that we are torturing our children with all these enrichment classes. Even the PM himself stated the case of a student who basically spend ALL his time after school with tuition, music and swimming lessons, and who had to eat his lunch in the car when being driven from one class to another.


So if we do it, we get condemned as kiasu parents. If we don’t do it and if everyone else do it, our children get marginalized in their adulthood.
Catch-22. Maybe the best way is to ask our children if they enjoy their enrichment classes and just let them do those they love. It’s not work if they like doing it.

[janetfong]

Ya lor Tats y i will ask them whether they like it or not, if not then i will withdraw them out. I feel tat is important tat they like these enrichment classes. If not, is a chores to them.

[ChiefKiasu]

Judy:

Hey all, I am new to this and i am excited when i read all the contributions from you guys!


I am not the in-person for forum but i do feel that i need to share.

My son and my niece is with CMA since July 07. They teach using abacus using 2 hands.

Hm... frankly I cannot tell if it's beneficial to the children, still monitoring. But my son actually scored highest in his K2 maths exam. Though it's exam but think the teacher provide minimal guide when they do the papers.

Anyone has any recommendation on how to test my son? In order to determine if this course in beneficial?

Yuh hor Judy, since your son is in K2 this year, does it mean next week is his first day in Primary school? Which school he going har? Exciting right?

[dragonball]

janetfong:

Ya lor Tats y i will ask them whether they like it or not, if not then i will withdraw them out. I feel tat is important tat they like these enrichment classes. If not, is a chores to them.

Kids learn faster if they are interested. But my kid is only interested in playing. The course I send him to, he doesn't like it at first, need to condition him for a while before he accept it. Same as the pre nursery that I sent him, there was a period of time when he refused to attend the nursery (especially after a long school holiday). It take sometime before he accepted going to school is part of his routine.

So sometime I wonder, how do we really know if the course we send them to is a chore or for the good of them. Hard been a parent.

[super_dad]

But but but....why need to do mental math when you can use a calculator? :P....I suppose that in the future, you can talk to a calculator...eg. what is the square root of 5.487..and it will shoot back an answer in 1 sec. . How to beat that? :)...It is like learning kung fu, when people are killing each other with guns.

[dragonball]

super_dad:

But but but....why need to do mental math when you can use a calculator? :P....I suppose that in the future, you can talk to a calculator...eg. what is the square root of 5.487..and it will shoot back an answer in 1 sec. . How to beat that? :)...It is like learning kung fu, when people are killing each other with guns.

I suppose this is a way of cultivating the brain. It will look cool if you just stand down there without pressing the calculator and out come the answer to complicated arithmetics. Isn't that cool

[jedamum]

have finally decided to drop my boy off abacus training cos he resent using abacus method to do sums which he can do using normal method. think he doesn’t have the ‘left brain’ power to visualise the workings of the mental abacus.

[ChiefKiasu]

jedamum:

have finally decided to drop my boy off abacus training cos he resent using abacus method to do sums which he can do using normal method. think he doesn't have the 'left brain' power to visualise the workings of the mental abacus.

Not all techniques are suitable for everyone. Just like mindmaps which looks like a mess to me! Most important is to make sure your kid is comfortable with the techniques he use.

[jedamum]

ChiefKiasu:

jedamum:

have finally decided to drop my boy off abacus training cos he resent using abacus method to do sums which he can do using normal method. think he doesn't have the 'left brain' power to visualise the workings of the mental abacus.

Not all techniques are suitable for everyone. Just like mindmaps which looks like a mess to me! Most important is to make sure your kid is comfortable with the techniques he use.

i agree...but to a certain extent, we have to see that the techniques are MOE 'approved' too. there goes 'creativity'!

[phantom]

jedamum:

ChiefKiasu:

[quote=\"jedamum\"]have finally decided to drop my boy off abacus training cos he resent using abacus method to do sums which he can do using normal method. think he doesn't have the 'left brain' power to visualise the workings of the mental abacus.

Not all techniques are suitable for everyone. Just like mindmaps which looks like a mess to me! Most important is to make sure your kid is comfortable with the techniques he use.

i agree...but to a certain extent, we have to see that the techniques are MOE 'approved' too. there goes 'creativity'![/quote]MOE always change their model. Now I think they are using MPM (Multi Process Model) to teach primary school kids math, which is suppose to do algebra with algebra method but using visualization.