kumon ans sn kids anyone?

[PeachyClairHasBadHair]

May be getting desperate here, but does anyone know of any cases of kids with HFA / As who ahve benifitted from Kumon?

[Tiggiwinkle]

Peachy-My 17 year old DS has dyspraxia, dyscalculia and is probably AS as well (currently being assessed). He went to Kumon maths for a while but frankly he found it too boring and repetitive. They do not really actively teach them anything, but get them doing exercises over and over again. It involves a lot of work for you too as you have to mark everything they do ready for the next session. My DS hated it!

[Davros]

I know a couple of kids (AS/HFA) who have done it but I've got no idea how they got on! I do remember one mum saying that her DS liked having worksheets or whatever to do and to get on with them independently.

[snorkle]

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[snorkle]

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[littleducks]

i used to nanny for a family with a little girl who was statemented and in a special unit for teaching pt at school, but she have a diagnosed named condition if you understand. I used to do her kumon books with her, i cant remember much of the maths but i used to get annoyed that she would just guess from the pictures write over the top o the letters and not have any understanding of the words, eg there would be a pic of a fox, fox written to read (but she would guess) the fox written to go over, then just fo written to go over and you had to put in the x but 50% of the time she would forget to put in the x and withgout the pic she wouldnt have a clue. I dont find the repetition helpful she did same set of books 2/3 times and never learnt the words but knew the piccys even when they were a bit more abstract. It did improve her handwriting though

Tiggiwinkle-you had to do marking? our local kumon pays some students and older school kids to mark the books.

[Tiggiwinkle]

Littleducks-yes, we were expected to do the marking and a real pain it was too!
To be honest, I did wonder what we were paying for, as the person who ran it did nothing more than hand out the books. (and tell him off if the marks were not good enough!)

[Saturn74]

We did Kumon maths for a year. Both my boys are dyslexic. DS1 (10) loathed every second of it. DS2 (8) liked the routine of it all, and it really helped him with his number bonds. They tried Kumon English too, but both gave it up within a month as they were bored senseless. It didn't work for them as their reading is much better than their writing, and I don't think the Kumon system accomodated this well.

[PeachyClairHasBadHair]

Thanks guys.

it's really the English, as Sam doesn't have any issues with maths bar their bizarre 'take a number put it on your head, take another and put that on yur arm, how many numbers are you wearing?' terminology, which frankly would annoy me too.

Sam loves those little workbooks you can buy in Smiths, is it the same sort of idea?

Sam missed a lot of the start of his schoolinga s he transferred from a school with no reception teaching to one that began on day one of reception, he missed all the letter sounds etc.

[Mum2FunkyDude]

PeachyClairHasBadHai,

My sister owns a Kumon centre with maths and english. She also teaches full time at a remedial school. I will send her an email and ask what her general feel is, be warned though it might take a while for her to respond, she is not good at returning emails, and tend to do them over weekends!

[PeachyClairHasBadHair]

mum2FD- thst would be great, tahnk you

Sam is HFA (high functioning autism), with a verbal age of over four years above his chronological one but is not progressing in readinga nd writing, which i thnkis more due to bullying / misunderstanding of phonics methods they use, with the effectively missing a year thing as well

[frogs]

Bink's ds does kumon English, iirc. I have met her ds -- he's not SN, I don't think, but I know there have been some issues, and she thought the kumon might help his communication.

We've done it the other way round -- ds has done a year of kumon maths because his maths skills were so far behind his English, and it has helped IMO. He is thoroughly NT, but I think the repetition has been very helpful (he is not a natural with numbers) and the time incentives have been very good at helping him to just get on and do the work rather than faffing about endlessly. But after a year he did get pretty fed up with the repetitiveness of it and the narrow focus, so we've agreed to do commercial workbooks, thus saving £45 a month and the weekly half-hour hanging around at the Kumon centre with a grumpy 2yo.

A different friend was told by the Ed Psych who assessed her son as dyspraxic that Kumon was no good for dyspraxics -- something to do with the fact that they don't recognise patterns in the same way as other children?

[Bink]

Peachy, my ds (who's got some definite problems with social skills and concentration, but otherwise fairly brainy) has found Kumon English a big help.

He's a good reader but school were at their wits' end with his total inability (refusal, really) to produce anything written - he would self-distract (picking at paper, kicking, twiddling, singing, poking neighbours, you name it) to extreme degree to avoid having to pick up a pencil. He's been doing Kumon (only the English bit) for about six months and it has transformed his attitude. He still finds the creative aspect very difficult - I think the way he thinks just doesn't translate naturally into words - but he cheerily motors through his worksheets, and so, at a basic level, isn't afraid of a pencil any more.

It was hard work at first, though - we did have to do bribery to get him to do the first worksheets - but there's no question of needing to do that now. (Have a search on my name - I've posted about Kumon and him elsewhere too.)

[Bink]

Funny - Frogs - cross-posted!!

[frogs]

bink. Glad to hear he's doing well.

My only proviso about kumon English (and I haven't looked at it in that much detail) is that it isn't phonically-based, afaik. I I have a background as an academic linguist, so I'm allowed to be a bit precious about the sheer phonological illiteracy of some commercial reading schemes. But if your ds isn't getting on with the phonics anyway, it may not be an issue for him.

I think as a system Kumon is very good at getting children to focus and work to a target, something that many children (mine, anyway) haven't often encountered in the classroom, where they can get away with not doing much. I'd be interested to see some proper UK-based research on Kumon, but there doesn't seem to be much objectivity -- people tend to be either fanatically pro- or incredibly anti- it, usually depending on whether their particular child got anything out of it.

[JennyLee]

This is exactly the question I was wondering too as my son would benefit from extra help...inspired question peachy

[JennyLee]

and after reading this I am still not sure, it sounds like you could do just as well buying workbooks and marking them yourself for less cost, I thought Kumon had tutors that helped the child to do the work not just give you stuff and you supervise them and mark it so I would rather buy workbooks myself .

[Bink]

You are right JennyLee, there really isn't any "tutoring" as such, so far as I've seen - the idea is more the discipline of it - child does worksheets every day and gradually whatever the idea is (subtraction, or telling subject from object, or whatever) becomes second nature. It's sort of piano practice, is my take on it.

So for my able but flighty ds it has had particular benefits - primarily as an exercise in learning to focus, plus (but maybe only incidentally) as to understanding of grammar. (Though I should say he's picked up more "proper" grammar than I was ever taught - knows what a predicate is - I never did.)

[snorkle]

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[Tiggiwinkle]

They dont teach anything at all as far as I could see. My DS had particular difficulties with maths as he has dyscalculia, and I was hoping they could teach him some strategies-but, as I said earlier, all the person who ran it did was hand out hundreds of workbooks repeating the same exercises. We were left to help him with any difficulties at home.

[JennyLee]

Thanks snorkle , blink and tiggiewinkle, have certainly given varied views on Kumon and the benefits of it. I see that the discipline would be a helpful thing. is it over 200 pounds a month or is it more like 50 pounds a month? aprrox price would be a big factor for me at the moment as am a student

[JennyLee]

Is alright just checked out their site and saw the fees for myself, and noted it is a study programme not tutoring so that answers my questions

[Earlybird]

Can you buy the Kumon workbooks here? Saw a few for sale in America last month in a Parent/Teacher store. No idea if they're the same ones used in the courses though.

[PeachyClairHasBadHair]

I like the anaology of Weightwatchers- weightwatchers worked for me.

I have a feeling sam would enjoy this as he does love structure, I think I might phone the instructor for a chat. Any more opinions welcome!

[singersgirl]

My mum bought me a couple of the Kumon workbooks with DS2 (NT and just 5) in mind when she was in Canada recently. I haven't seen them here.

They are dead boring pages of addition (pages of adding 1, pages of adding 2, pages of adding 1 and 2), and she thought they would be good for DS2 to practise his number formation on without having to think too much. But they are so boring we have struggled somewhat....

[Eve]

HI,

... i can't comment on SN, so excuse me but butting in , but my DS has benefited hugely from Kumon Literacy.

He struggles with phonics, his kumon instructor has identifed him as a sight reader and even though he has been doing literacy only since August his reading is improving hugely. It giving him a lot of confidence as his leader is very very positive and he is getting much more praise and sees regular rewards more than he would at school.

I think highly of it and my DS will very happily sit and do his workbooks every day without any complaint as they are quick, he finds them easy as the tutor his taken him quite far back to establish all the ground rules and get his confidence up.