Smart Brain And Uc Mas Math Programs For Children

[pulpfiction]

If you google "SmartBrain" or "UCMAS" you find a technique for teaching children to do 10 digit math manipulation in their heads. It uses an Abacus at first and then the children stop using the abacus and visualize the abacus in their heads. The idea is not to just allow kids to be able to perform amazing number manipulations but rather to develop the young child's growing brain. It's a 3 year program in total.

Studies are clear that bilingual kids have more gray matter development and their brains perform better in many ways than monolinguals. I wonder if this SmartBrain program does the same brain development for young children.

Anybody had any real experience with this program?

There are many of these schools in Bangkok and in India there are thousands and thousands of schools teaching this technique. I'm considering putting my children into this program so would appreciate any feedback.

[saraburioz]

There are too many if these such schools in Thailand . You can send your kids to a good international school where they don't need this kind of thing or if they go to a normal crap Thai school they have too much. How old is the kid? I have a few and am fighting to let them not go to bloody school evey day after school and on Saturdays . I want normal kids not geniuses.

[pulpfiction]

There are too many if these such schools in Thailand . You can send your kids to a good international school where they don't need this kind of thing or if they go to a normal crap Thai school they have too much. How old is the kid? I have a few and am fighting to let them not go to bloody school evey day after school and on Saturdays . I want normal kids not geniuses.

I'm not sure you really have a jist of what these SmartBrain and UCMAS schools are. International schools teach a "normal" British, American etc. program, Thai schools do not teach this type of program at all.

Having a "normal" and happy child is the most important thing for me. Just because I'd like him to be "smart" doesn't mean I don't want him to be normal and happy.

My kids can still play sports and have fun times with their friends but supposedly this program is made to be fun too. I have no desire for them to compete at any high level but rather just to have the mental stimulation, concentration exercises, memory development, etc. that go along with this program.

What I'd really like is to hear from somebody who has actually done the program at an early age and is now an adult. Their perspective would be ideal.

[Kilgore Trout]

Sounds similar to Kumon math schools which are very popular here as well as schools that copy this method.

In the states, at least the curriculum I worked with is going the other way; conceptual understanding of math not so much computation and skills drills.

[gregb]

Not really sure about this program in particular. Some friends in the states have turned me on to something called "The Right Start" (http://www.alabacus.com) which sounds very similar, but it is a home school course. For me, anything I can teach the children myself is always better than what can be achieved by a paid educator. I don't know what they charge at that school, but the home school option is probably less expensive too.

I have heard good things about abacus style lessons in general. I myself did not learn this method when I was young, but as I progressed through school I naturally developed the ability to visualize numbers. It is truly the only way to become proficient in the subject. It's like learning a language really. You can never become fluent if you have to translate into your native tounge. You will never be truly proficient at math if you don't have an intuitive grasp of numbers and their relationships, and looking at it this teaching style seems to be a natural way to start.

[pulpfiction]

Not really sure about this program in particular. Some friends in the states have turned me on to something called "The Right Start" (http://www.alabacus.com) which sounds very similar, but it is a home school course. For me, anything I can teach the children myself is always better than what can be achieved by a paid educator. I don't know what they charge at that school, but the home school option is probably less expensive too.

I have heard good things about abacus style lessons in general. I myself did not learn this method when I was young, but as I progressed through school I naturally developed the ability to visualize numbers. It is truly the only way to become proficient in the subject. It's like learning a language really. You can never become fluent if you have to translate into your native tounge. You will never be truly proficient at math if you don't have an intuitive grasp of numbers and their relationships, and looking at it this teaching style seems to be a natural way to start.

I looked at the site you recommended. It could be interesting and useful. One problem with home study is I travel too much and wouldn't be able to consistently ensure it's followed. Cost wise, the SmartBrain schools are 9,000 baht per term if in English, 4,500 if in Thai. 10 terms total over 3 years. Since my kids are Eng/Thai bilingual, I can put them into the Thai school. The sessions are 2 hours long, one session per week. You are expected to do 10 to 20 minutes homework per day. Guess I'll have the same homework challenge.

The thing I don't get about SmartBrain is: Does it really promote brain development, i.e. an increase of the wiring network in the brain. Kids can start SmartBrain at 4.5 yrs of age and at this time, their brains are really developing and therefore perhaps it does actually work. However, I would love to be able to get some additional data beyond testimonials on their web sites, i.e. talk to people that did the program years ago. I know in India, literally hundreds of thousands of kids have been doing this program (it's called UC MAS there but it appears to be exactly the same) and they certainly pump out a huge number of very talented engineers. Is there correlation? I don't know.

I wonder if my kids did the full 3 year program, would they lose the skill in time just as you lose any skill if you don't practice it (guess the obvious answer is yes, never mind). However the reasoning for taking this course is not so they can do a party trick but to have the brain developed more so other analytical and life skills are increased for life.

[gregb]

The thing I don't get about SmartBrain is: Does it really promote brain development, i.e. an increase of the wiring network in the brain. Kids can start SmartBrain at 4.5 yrs of age and at this time, their brains are really developing and therefore perhaps it does actually work. However, I would love to be able to get some additional data beyond testimonials on their web sites, i.e. talk to people that did the program years ago. I know in India, literally hundreds of thousands of kids have been doing this program (it's called UC MAS there but it appears to be exactly the same) and they certainly pump out a huge number of very talented engineers. Is there correlation? I don't know.

If you've ever wondered how chess grand masters get so good at the game, it is because they start very young, and they don't actually play out the moves ahead of time the way a computer does. Instead, they seem to just act on hunches that this is the best thing to do, and they might not even be able to tell you why. They just know what is right. There is a reason for this. What has happened is their brain has actually hijacked the fusiform facia region of the brain. This is an incredibly powerful pattern matching structure that is generally used for the complex task of face recognition. In the case of chess grand masters, they have actually forced this area into service in order to "see" patterns in chess games (as confirmed by MRI scans), and just as we can recognize a single face out of millions, they can recognize a single chess pattern out of hundreds of thousands of games they have studied. They did it by challenging their brain with complex visual patterns when they were young and malleable. Once the patterns have formed, the patterns embedded appear to stay active for life.

The human brain is amazingly adept at pattern recognition if you can teach your child to visualize something. There are other equally complex structures in the brain of course, such as the language center, but visualizing patterns in complex, repetitive tasks is the most adopted technique for becoming an expert at anything.

With this in mind, any time I see an educational system that tries to make people visualize a subject, I know they are on to a winning strategy. When I went to school, they made me learn how to diagram sentences while studying English grammar. This is an amazingly beautiful way to get people to see the structure and relationships of sentences, but sadly it seems to have been dropped from most school curriculums, and I've never seen a single English as a foreign language school try to teach this system. There is an adage that says a picture is worth a thousand words. It is also worth a thousand numbers or a thousand repetitive examples. What people can "see", they can understand. In fact, in many languages the verb "see" can actually be substituted for "understand" in most contexts.

So, I don't think you can go wrong if your goal is to teach your child to visualize a complex subject, no matter what method you use. The abacus is one of the earliest examples of human engineering designed to facilitate this task, and much like sentence diagramming, I think it is criminal that this or something like it is not used to drive home the skill. I understand you would like more first hand experience with this question, but even without that information I think you can still make a good theoretical argument for why this type of a program would be more than just a scam. For the right student who is willing to put in the effort, I think this technique will stay with them for a lifetime.

[pulpfiction]

So, I don't think you can go wrong if your goal is to teach your child to visualize a complex subject, no matter what method you use. The abacus is one of the earliest examples of human engineering designed to facilitate this task, and much like sentence diagramming, I think it is criminal that this or something like it is not used to drive home the skill. I understand you would like more first hand experience with this question, but even without that information I think you can still make a good theoretical argument for why this type of a program would be more than just a scam. For the right student who is willing to put in the effort, I think this technique will stay with them for a lifetime.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the subject, it appears to be something that is more than a passing interest for you.

Many years ago I remember coming across a book that taught memory techniques, the kind where you could remember 1 to 100 items in a row simply by applying mnemonic associations with each item. There were a number of different types of things that could be quickly memorized such as for example Oct 28th, 2031 will be a Wednesday. The book explained many techniques for memorizing many different things. I was in my early 20's at the time and simply was too lazy to bother studying the book and learning the techniques. I also saw some displays of people with these incredible memories on TV talk shows or wherever. I remember thinking, it is just unconscionable that this isn't taught in schools to everybody. Imagine how nice it would be to never have to make a grocery list or how much easier it would be to study medicine or law when you could remember the names of all the body parts or laws with little effort. If these techniques were part of the normal education system, we would simply pick up the skills the same as we learned any subject at school. We would end up with memory abilities so much greater than they are today. I guess the reality is, it would be hard to find teachers with this skill that could teach it effectively. However, there seemingly isn't any effort being made to implement programs like this into the curriculum.

I am going to the SmartBrain Thailand head office this week to talk more indepthly about their program. Again I would really like to talk to somebody who did the program 10 or 15 years ago and see if they think the benefits were significant or not, hopefully I'll get more than just a sales pitch at the head office.

I also have been trying to get more information on the Kumon school system and will go visit one of their schools this week too.