To Kumon or not to Kumon. That is the question.

[megabored]

DD is starting school in September. Below are the Pros and Cons I have been debating recently.

1. She is bright, so should be okay without extra help in school
2. It is too early to put her through this
3. Kumon is expensive and time consuming.

The Pros

1. It may give her that bit of extra confidence at school
2. Earlier is better as then she can grow with that system
3. Its not so expensive as to be prohibitive.

I really cant decide either way. Please someone help?

Kumon does no harm as long as you know what you are getting for your money.

I mean, I remember one mum going on about how she paid for years of Kumon maths and how disgusted she now was with it. Apparently she sat her DC down in front of a 11+ maths practice paper and realised that Kumon maths doesn't really prepare you for the 11+. IMO her expectation was at fault rather than Kumon.

Similarly others parents sit their DCs in front of worksheets, go hands off for a few months and then complain that DC is still struggling.

Wow, interesting how grim others' experiences of Kumon are.

Our dcs have done well with it.

DS (17) is a natural mathematician, A* at GCSE and A in AddMaths, doing Maths and Further Maths for A-level - and he has still benefited hugely from it just BECAUSE it's repetitive. Not all learning is intrinsically interesting - all language learning for example involves an element of repetition - or should.

Dd hated maths and saw herself as dreadful at it - after a year of Kumon she is much more confident and able.

So for us it was money well spent, though it's one of those things where it depends on you and your dcs. Just saying this because our experience is so different form those of most posters. DD also does Kumon English....

Of course they are very much in the minority. I was just unlucky getting a pair of them all to myself :). And TBH it is maybe quite unlikely they are on MN, because most people who go on threads like this are actually bothered with trying to find out what is best for their child as a person, trying to find that middle ground, rather than just blindly pushing their child forward and forward with no regard for their overall wellbeing.

posh I have noticed that too. I do not understand these things either. I am not afraid of the pesky foreigners and would not want the education system here to be like somewhere in Singapore or Japan where kid goes from school to tuition to sleep and that is all they do during the school week. I have seen this and it is detrimental in every way. However, agree with you that it is not a black or white answer and that the current system we haev here is not TOTALLY working. It is the arty farty stuff and the pressure to be arty farty and nothing else that does not help. I see my DD trying to write my name and spell as I type this all of her own accord. Why cant I feel free to teach her formally for 20mins a day and capture this? Am I then branded as a pushy mum who is verging on child abuse by oh dear using a worksheet?!

The REALLY important thing to remember is that the op's child is 4. So no way of knowing what sort of learner she is, and whether she might be the sort of child who might look at a worksheet , think "sod that for a game of soldiers" and dig her heels in! Some love worksheets- some it would turn off.

So wait and see.

"most people who go on threads like this are actually bothered with trying to find out what is best for their child as a person, trying to find that middle ground, rather than just blindly pushing their child forward and forward with no regard for their overall wellbeing"

And just when I thought that you was a reasonable person that I could seriously engage with, you come along with this sweeping statement that drops everyone that you don't agree with into a big overly pushy unfeeling parent box :o

I find that a lot of parents who in favour of so-called pushy parenting techniques can't be arsed to come onto threads like and argue their case. Thus it gives the illusion that MN or the Real World is full of people that agree with you.

I don't think I've come across a pushy parent yet. The one parent who had a maths tutor for a five year old turned out to have a good reason, her child was difficult and genuinely responded to being taught maths in that way. I'm sure there are people who genuinely believe that because Mozart could compose at five their child should do so too and because Kasparov became world champion at fourteen their two year old child should recite competitive chess moves for two hours before bedtime. But I'd imagine that those people are slightly deranged. There are lots of mad people out there and some of them are parents. Learning the three rs comes well within the range of three, four and five year olds and still leaves endless time for playing.

Hmmmm that's not quite what I meant, everyone will come to their own conclusions about how much 'pushing' is ok, but at least most of them will have given it some thought and weighed it up with the other aspects of their child's life. I certainly wouldn't shove all kumonning parents into a metaphorical giant box :o or assume that they were unfeeling just because they came to a different conclusion to me!

(though I do maintain that people who don't recognise the value and importance of learning through play are, at best, numpties :o)

Cbeebies, Cbeebies- oh yeah, oh yeah..
Oh sorry- threads moved on and all that. Tum te tum. tra la la.
Let play and play all day.. .

"As I said above, we turned to Kumon when we discovered that the state primary wasn't going to push DC. DC entered Year R ahead of his peers in reading and writing, thanks to the efforts of the pre school, and by Year 1 the boy was just plain bored. Hence Kumon."

He was bored at school so you thought the answer was Kumon, with its endless repetitive worksheet drill?

@Fuzz - I stand corrected

Re your point about the value of play, it depends on the child.

When DS was nearly 4 we put him into a Saturday morning music session for pre schoolers.

To cut a long story short, DS found the learning music through play so irritating and childish. Similarly, when it came to learning the times table his primary teacher insisted that he learn what he termed a 'silly song'.

IMO learning through play proponents ignore that some, dare I say it?, brighter kids respond to a more traditional method.

@clam - You may go :o at my posts but at the end of the day I'm the one that smiles smugly to myself when others post about not being able to get their teenagers to study or to do homework. Or how they can't get their DCs to focus on one thing.

So :o right back at you and I raise you a :o

That is a fair point, I was very much into sitting down with workbooks etc. Hence me struggling a bit at first with the fact that DD isn't (usually - occasionally she will spend hours on them)

Good for them to have a range of choices in the classroom as well as at home. I remember feeling happy at school (much more so than at home) and knowing that however I chose to direct my own learning was valid and exciting :)

Oh wait until they rebel PooshTun..[I'll lay off the grins].

Poosh, believe me , I am a pushy parent. I am quite willing to spend hours reading the numbers on lamp-posts and adding up all the numbers we see on car registration plates, and to spend money on more and more and more books for DD to devour, and to drive long distances each week to orchestra and music lessons and dance and sport.

I am not 'not pushy' because I don't enrol my children in programmes such as Kumon. I just show it in a slightly different way [deranged grin] and perhaps see educational value in activities you might not see as educational. Seems to be working so far [even wider deranged grin]....

Sunflowers DD asked to go on the computer earlier so we tried out the numtums part of cbeebies - not sure about the programme itself but damn those things are cute!

Kumon definintely works for some dc. I know one who romped through the levels at primary school (loved it) and is now an exceptionally good mathematician (I'll be astounded if he doesn't gain A A for his maths & f maths A levels and go on to Cambridge). It also worked for my dd who needed the repetition to learn number bonds and tables. She was struggling at maths n primary, did kumon for about 2+ years (on and off - I can't say that she or I enjoyed it, and certainly if I'd had the motivation to do similar repetative work with her would not have needed kumon, but later she has told me she's glad she did it as she can now do the calculations without error which was he problem before. She is has an A* in her first 2 GCSE modules which I think is amazing for someone struggling as she was.

I think 4 might be a bit young to start, but I wouldn't right it off completely as some people do - it can have its place.

PushTun I don't know how old your DCs are. Mine are already teens and have a formidable work ethic, as all their exam/music/dram/sports results to date show. So, no need to worry on my behalf.

And do you really smile smugly when other people report problems with their DCs? I'd put a , except that I'm afraid I'm not hugely surprised, bearing in mind some of your previous comments to others on here.

A friend of mine swears by it...her DD was struggling with maths in reception and Kumon has really helped her. Doing very well now with maths (Y3). I suspect the same can be achieved at home if you're happy to do it. Horses for courses and all that.

I get that the OP's child is 4, but I find some of what people are saying here alarming.

Not all education can be a barrel of fun. Not all education can or should be child-led. Not all education can be learning through play. Sometimes you have to get through a period of boredom to master something. Showing a child this sometimes does involve pushing them to finish what they have started.

I'm also very alarmed by the way 'pushy' is being used here; apparently anyone who is not a full-hearted eager supporter of current educational standards in state schools is 'pushy', and anyone bothered about our relatively modest place in international league tables is pushy as well. Meanwhile statements are being made about e.g. education in Singapore which are scarily close to racism. Ethnocentrism, anyway.

And btw, Kumon English involves reading lots of books... so another misleading either-or above.

"Oh wait until they rebel PooshTun..[I'll lay off the grins]."

I'm grinning right now. Your arrogance is such that you must be right eh? So there can be only one outcome for me and it is going to be a negative one. Thanks for keeping an open mind. Here, have a :o for free.

I am sure that if Kumon at a young age could genuinely inoculate children against teenage rebellion there would be MANY takers! Is there any such statistical link that you know of. Poosh?

"And do you really smile smugly when other people report problems with their DCs? I'd put a hmm , except that I'm afraid I'm not hugely surprised, bearing in mind some of your previous comments to others on here"

Why do you assume that I am deriving enjoyment from the misery of others?

I also smile smugly when friends talk about how they only have to look at a pastry for them to gain pounds. I 'smile smugly' not because I take delight in their weight problems but because I'm lucky to have a metabolism that burns it all away.

Similarly, I 'smile smugly' because I consider myself lucky because I don't have those problems when it comes to homework and stuff.

"Not all education can be a barrel of fun. Not all education can or should be child-led. Not all education can be learning through play."

I don't think anyone has said it should be. What people are saying is that there are better ways to support a 4 year old's learning than worksheets. And people have made lots of helpful suggestions.

If the question had been asked about a 8 year old, for example, the answers would have been very different. I would still be anti kumon, but I would not have been suggesting a llaissez faire approach either.