Kumon Anyone?

[James191]

Hi there. This thread is about Kumon method. And we will ask about kumon too. Do you like kumon? How is it? What subject did you learn? What level are you in kumon?

About Kumon
The Kumon method, developed by educator Toru Kumon, is a math and reading educational method that is practiced in Kumon's own learning centers. The Kumon Method advocates several values of learning that include speed, accuracy and mastery of material before a student is able to move on to the next lesson. As of 2009, over 4 million students were studying under the Kumon Method at more than 26,000 Kumon Centers in 46 countries.

History
In 1954, Toru Kumon, a Japanese high school mathematics teacher, began to teach his eldest son due to his problems in mathematics at school. Kumon developed the Kumon Method. In 1956, Kumon opened the first Kumon Center in Osaka, Japan with the help of parents that were very interested in the Method. In 1958, he founded the Kumon Institute of Education, after which Kumon Centers began to open around the world. Since 1956, some 20 million students have been enrolled in Kumon. Today, there are around 4 million Kumon students worldwide. At present there are 1500 Kumon Centers in the USA, and there are a total of 26,000 Kumon Centers in 44 countries. This list of countries includes the USA, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, United Kingdom, Spain, Germany, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Thailand and more.

The programs
Kumon is a math and reading enrichment program. Students do not work together as a class, but progress through the curriculum at their own pace, moving on to the next level when they have achieved mastery of the previous level. Mastery is defined as speed (using a standard completion time) and accuracy. They take an achievement test at the end of each level.

Mathematics curriculum

-Level 7A: Counting to 10
-Level 6A: Counting to 30
-Level 5A: Line drawing, number puzzles to 50
-Level 4A: Reciting and writing numbers up to 220
-Level 3A: Adding with numbers up to 5
-Level 2A: Adding with numbers up to 10, subtracting with numbers up to 9
-Level A: Horizontal addition and subtraction of larger numbers
-Level B: Vertical addition and subtraction
-Level C: Multiplication, division
-Level D: Long multiplication, long division, introduction to fractions
-Level E: Fractions
-Level F: Four operations of fractions, decimals
-Level G: Positive/negative numbers, introduction to algebra
-Level H: Linear/simultaneous equations, inequalities, functions, graphs high school level math
-Level I: Factorization, square roots, quadratic equations, Pythagorean theorem
-Level J: Advanced algebra
-Level K: Functions: Quadratic, fractional, irrational, exponential
-Level L: Logarithms, basic limits, derivatives, integrals, and its applications
-Level M: Trigonometry, straight lines, equation of circles.
-Level N: Loci, limits of functions, sequences, differentiation
-Level O: Advanced differentiation, integration, applications of calculus, differential equations.
-Level X is an elective level; also, there are no tests available yet on this level.
-Level XT-Triangles: Sine, cosine theorems, application of trigonometry in area
-Level XV-Vectors: Vectors, inner products, equations of lines, planes, and figures in 3-space.
-Level XM-Linear algebra: Matrices, determinant, mapping, linear transformation
-Level XP-Probability: Permutations, combinations, probability, independent trials, expected value
-Level XS-Statistics: Binomial and normal distributions, probability density functions, confidence intervals, hypothesis testing
(Thanks to en.wikipedia.org)

English (EE) curriculum (I don't know what does EE stands for)

-Level 7A-6A Pre-reading skills
-Level 5A-2A Letters of the alphabet, vowel and consonant combinations; spelling patterns; basic grammar
-Level A-C Punctuation, simple sentences; grammar, sentence structures; synthesising information
-Level D-F Complex sentences, direct and indirect speech; paragraph structures; clauses, paraphrasing and concision
-Level G-I Text structure, persuasion, interpretation and summarising
-Level J-L Elements of critique, text analysis

English (EFL) curriculum (EFL stands for English as Foreign Language)

-Level 7A-5A Pre-reading skills
-Level 4A-2A Letter of the alphabet, spelling words
-Level A-C Simple sentences, basic conversation, basic grammar
-Level D-F Complex sentennces, grammar
-Level G-I Text structure, clauses, story contains 150-200 words (vocabs)
-Level J-L New idioms and grammar, story contains 500-800 words (vocabs)
-Level M-O Readind story contains 1000-2000 words (vocabs)
(Thanks to Kumon Thailand for EFL and UK for EE Website)
(I translated EFL cirriculum to english. Because it's in Thai language so my translation may be not right 100 percent)

Major Characters in English (EFL) (7A-I) (SPOILERS!!!)
This list appears in Level A-C Textbook
They make a first appearance in Level 7A
-The Bensons
-Peter: A kindhearthed father of Jill, Adam and Scott. He married with Susan. He is tall and fat.
-Susan: A kindhearthed mother of Jill, Adan and Scott. She
married with Peter. She is tall and slim.
-Jill: The oldest daughther of The Bensons. She's 12 years old. I think her closest freind is Mike.
-Adam: A wednesday child of The Bensons. He's 10 years old. I think her closest friend is Katie.
-Scott: The youngest son of the Bensons. He's 6 yesrs old. He's small. He likes soccer.
-The Millers
-David: A kindhearthed father of Mike and Katie. He married with Linda. He's thin and tall. He's a cook.
-Linda: A kindhearthed mother of Mike and Katie. She married with David. She is tall and slim.
-Mike: The oldest son of the Millers. He's 12 years old. (I think) He's thin and tall. (He's taller than Jill) He likes fishing.
-Katie: The youngest daughter of the Millers. She's 10 years old. She's short and thin.
The Bensons and The Millers make a last appearance at level I.

Major Characters in English (EFL) (E+)
-Luke: Molly's brother.
-Molly: Luke's sister.

Minor Characters in English (EFL)
-Teacher Sarah Smith
-Tom
-Kim
-Lucy
-Ted
-Tony
-Melissa
-Ben
-Sam
-Max
-Meg
-John
-Julie
-Ross
-Gary

(I'll add more.)

Hoo... Thats all about Kumon Method. Okay let's ask about your kumon.

-Do you like kumon? Why?
-How is it?
-What subject did you learn in Kumon?
-What level that you started? When?
-What level are you in kumon now?
-What grade are you? (school)

Example: (My profile about Kumon)
-Yes, I like it. It's practice my skills and it's THRILLING!!!But it's fun, too.
-It's a method that not focuses to student's age. Some of them can solve the caculus too.
-I studies Math and English (EFL).
-I started math at level 2A (since March 2008) and English (EFL) at level 4A (since August 2010).
-Math: J141 (Equations) (I'm not sure this one. It's in Thai)
English (EFL): G71 (Verbs)
(19 January 2011)
-I'm in grade 6

How about you?

[FluffyAxe]

There is no way I'm going to read that.

[o0-0o]

I did Math a long time ago from grade 4-5. Got to level F. It really helps put you ahead, like some of the fraction and decimal stuff I didn't even need to use until about grade 9.

[tatsumaru7]

At 1/19/11 04:31 AM, FluffyAxe wrote: There is no way I'm going to read that.

me neither

[RubberTrucky]

Considered the mathematics part and that coincide largely with what i'm used to (only trigoniometry came before differentiation and so on)

What I think is important is that from early ages the memorisation of definitions and proofs should be less stressed. mathematics should be about logics and it should be introduced as such.

[Gimmick]

i thought kumon was a typo.
also,

tl;dr

[Jonners]

I was under the impression that Kumon was for small kids who can't read good and wanna learn to do other stuff good too. This would make you about 10 years old.

[Struggle]

This guy is a secret agent from Kumon coming here to advertise to us.

[ArmouredGRIFFON]

Kumon.
Is.
Hell.

I fucking hated that place, I didn't learn anything about maths, it is just a conditioning program gaurenteed to get you used to repetitive tasks. It doesn't help your understanding of mathematics at all!

[Idiot-Finder]

At 1/19/11 04:08 PM, Jonners wrote: I was under the impression that Kumon was for small kids who can't read good and wanna learn to do other stuff good too. This would make you about 10 years old.

It's not, it can help put you ahead depending on the level you're on. It helped me with math for a large portion of time until high school, it went downhill from there.

Oddly enough, on reading I started off slow.

How slow? When I was in fifth grade, I was stuck on A level.

[Idiot-Finder]

To quell confusion, English = Reading

At least on where I went to anyway.

[Asandir]

I don´t like maths and Kumon seems way too crazy.

[Idiot-Finder]

At 1/19/11 04:38 PM, Asandir wrote: I don´t like maths and Kumon seems way too crazy.

It is and it can help.

I never got to finish math (did got a plaque for finishing J level)

Did managed to finish Reading/English

[wildface098]

what the fuck's a kumon?

tl;dr

[razorbladesigh]

I got 7A on all of dem things. that's like the best you can get.

u jelly?

[AbstractPathologist]

At 1/19/11 09:54 PM, razorbladesigh wrote: I got 7A on all of dem things. that's like the best you can get.

So you're very smart then?

aWeSoMe

[tox]

i went to kumon.. i answered 60 simple math questions in about 100 seconds, i got 3 wrong.. these were long devision and multiplication things.. they then told me that they wanted me to start 5 grades below my current grade in math skills training..
my mother told them to fuck off and that i will remain stupid if they were only going to waste my time.
fuck kumon

[ViZi]

TL;DR Are you paying to be tutored?

[Idiot-Finder]

At 1/19/11 09:58 PM, quagmire690 wrote: i went to kumon.. i answered 60 simple math questions in about 100 seconds, i got 3 wrong.. these were long devision and multiplication things.. they then told me that they wanted me to start 5 grades below my current grade in math skills training..

Had it been English, I can understand why they would start you slowly.

[James191]

At 1/19/11 04:20 PM, Struggle wrote: This guy is a secret agent from Kumon coming here to advertise to us.

No, I'm not a secret agent.
I'm a student there.
I'm just 12. (So I'm not an agent)
Lulz.

[GenocidalTendencies]

Some people can't count to 10?

[General-Idiot]

At 1/19/11 04:31 AM, FluffyAxe wrote: There is no way I'm going to read that.

This.

[Kadian]

Read the first line, looked down a bit and realized....tl;dr.

[RubberTrucky]

At 1/19/11 10:15 PM, The777Demon wrote:
I get penalized for being smart when it came to math, I'm not the only one though my story is very common. I didn't like to show work or write down all my equations etc because I knew the answer long before I finished writing that shit out. What cracked me up sometimes was when i wrote the answer before showing the work and got points taken away despite having the right answer, because i made a mistake in the work when i had to write it down.

Hmm, so you are one of the people who calculate everything and then simply put down 'x=20'?
It's a tricky thing, but there are reasons why to write things out.
One is that a simple error of calculation can produce the wrong answer. So when you write the wrong answer the teacher can't backtrack to all of your steps to see where you were wrong and grant you points for the correct steps you've taken.
Secondly, didactically, the procedure is important. It's what has been taught about and a test is there to see how much you've understood from the mathematics you've been taught. Even if you write the correct answer, this can be through sheer luck and you might make the same mistake later on and the anwer might be wrong there.

Overall, just describe what you've done to obtain the answer and show you know the procedure of solving a math problem.

If the teacher takes you on details because (s)he only holds to a model answer and refuses to deviate over a valuable alternative, then I agree (s)he is a bad maths teacher.

[James191]

Hay guys. Do you belive me? I started Kumon EFL at 4A. After only seven months. I'm in H!!!!!!

[Cryoma]

I thought it was a spice.

[FigishPig3000]

Can you put that in laymen's terms? I'm interested, but not enough to waste my night reading about it.