Ive just seen an inspiring documentary. It was about a genious boy (very much like Rainman) that was able to make complex arithmetic in his head with abnormal ease. He then went on to explain that anyone can do it. Its just a matter of training. The documentary then went on to show examples and scenes of superbly drilled Chinese primary school children, in class, undertaking mathematical arithmetic exercises with superb skill.

The thing is, they were trained on nothing more than an abacus. They were eventually trained so well, that they could perform these calculations without the abacus by simply "pretending" it was there in their minds.

This threw me back and made me think, boy i had such a shit education when i was younger. I mean, really shit.

If i ruled the world, i would introduce the abacus as a part of everyday school maths. Kids would practice arithmetic at an early age.

I don't think you'ld want to be on a Chinese school. And an abacus isn't going to teach you math. I think you can learn better with conventional methods if you consider normal "western" training instead of a Chinese drill.

No no, im saying merge the two. Raise the importance of the abacus to develop arithmetic. But in no case "drill" them. Simply introcude it early and set exercises. Im sure if you know how poor my primary school was, youd agree.

why learn to do in your head what can be done faster and more easily with technology? What a waste.

Exactly...save your head for stuff that you can't do with the help of technology.

I simply don't think the abacus teaches better without the drill. The documentary shows two things: Chinese boys are very good at math and they learn it on an abacus. You distill from that that they learn well because of the abacus, and I doubt that.

I'd like to join in this conversation, but what the heck is an abacus??

Anyway, since i'm following a teachers education now, i've heard a lot about learning processes for children. Which is very interesting btw.
I'll add a rant about it later

abacus = telraam

Imo, any drill in young years is good. Not that these kids will tomorrow be the better in arithmetic or the other kind of the problems, but they'll potentially have more swiftness while taking down the more complex problems - which we meet every day on our jobs/researchs. It just increase perception and fasten the connecting of the facts which can be pretty useful later. Better is to do it while brain is young and flexibile than to strive to it later. More you wait, more it is hard.

Although that *drill* with abacus is very light, I think it useful for the kids in age 4-8, yes. Later could come more messy things like i.e. a introduce in foundaments of geometry. There are many ppl in age over 30 who cannot even in one hour imagine or rough draw the intersection of two cylinders with normal axes. etc.

The problem with education as i got it, is that they didn't take into account that a class of children is a very heterogene group -> there's a big difference in what they can learn at a certain age. Some children will be able to learn how to multiply at the age of 6, others at the age of 7, 8, .. .

Now when i was that age, the system was: "in second grade (age of 7) ALL children learn to multiply". For some children this was no problem whatsoever, others seemed to be able to multiply, but they never learned how it 'really' works (cognative calculating or whatever it's called), they really got drilled to know that 7*7 equals 49, but never earned insight into math.
In theory, basic school system has changed here some years ago, the 'end-terms' that a student must reach is not determined every year as before, but at the end of the 6th grade (12 years old), when he/she has to be ready for the next step.
This is theory though, not many schools have actually changed a lot, in theory no child will have to do a certain year twice before the 6th year, since the requirements he has to meet are only set at the end of that year, in practice ...

Anyway, just trying to point out here that "drilling" is not the way to teach children something. Like Derf points out, you can teach them to 'solve' difficult problems, but they have no insight whatsoever if it gets drilled.

The abacus can be a helpfull tool to learn math imo, as a visual support, as long as it isn't drilled.

Oh and btw: our teacher (at the teachers education) said: "one thing is certain, you can't do worse than most of the current teachers". Says enough me thinks.

I didn't see this documentary, but I'm with Arathorn on this one. I used an Abacus in my younger days, and I'm shit at math.

And, if you ruled the world, I'd leave.

hah chinese kids, they are just useless man

being at imperial college, we get more chinese people than english people on our courses, now they are amazing at maths because only their elite come over here to get a degree. the guy who came top of the year last year was chinese and he is a genius. but none of them have any common sense at all. my mechanical engineering course is often described as maths with metal work, and to a fair extent it is. so the chinese kids who spent all day doing math drills are amazing at the maths side, but get them to do any metal work or whatever and they are absolute retards.

in general they all play no physical sports, the have no common sense and they have no lives, so the chinese education system does teach them maths and whatever but no social skills whatsoever which is what western schools try hard to do from an early age. so i don't think the chinee education really teaches them anything useful at all...

Interesting posts from all of you guys.

You all seem to generally reject the long-term use of the abacus as an effective teaching tool. Thats fair enough.

What Franny said makes sense, too much drilling or overuse can cause the pupils to become spasticated in other areas. I agree.

Mole, you mentioned something about the fact that you used an abacus at an early age. For how long was this? And how frequently in a week would you use it?

In conclusion. I agree that the long term use can start to make negative effects. However, if it were used in all primary schools for 3 sessions a week, it would be quite effective in teaching pupils how maths works (to a minimal extent).

I think that math is taught decent enough in primary school as it is, with tables of multiplications and such...heck, I probably knew more about math back then than I do now (no kidding).

As for Chinese kids....their way of doing things doesn't promote creative thinking. Einstein was kicked from school as a kid, for example, but that didn't make him less capable. You don't learn to think out of the box by being drilled into the box.

If derf ruled the world, he would be assassinated.