From: Pang, Hokkun (HPang@Yesmail.com)
Date: Mon May 07 2001 - 09:19:54 PDT
To make up for my bad manners, here is an article on how Russian immigratns
are helping to teach math to American kid.
... Teachers at the Russian School don't rely on textbooks or teachers'
guides - they make up their own problems, so it's easy to speed or slow the
curriculum to fit a particular group. And they say they go deeper than just
memorizing formulas.
''We don't tell kids, `This is just the formula, remember this,''' Khavinson
said. ''We try to discover the formula together, using all our previous
knowledge.'' ...
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/127/nation/A_Russian_solution_to_US_proble
m+.shtml
A Russian solution to US problem
Emigres' formula for math success pays off in Newton
By Scott S. Greenberger, Globe Staff, 5/7/2001
EWTON - Irene Khavinson loves her new country. So she pauses, staring
sheepishly at the table top, before offering her opinion on how mathematics
is taught in American schools.
''I hate to say this, but everything is wrong,'' Khavinson finally says in
her heavy Russian accent. ''The approach is wrong. It's too easy. It's not
connected. They jump from topic to topic, and topics should be connected in
math.''
Khavinson taught math for 15 years in what was then Leningrad before
immigrating to the United States a decade ago. She shied from teaching here,
fearing she'd have trouble managing unruly American students. But now, after
stints as an accountant and working at a drapery company, she's back in the
classroom - using an Old World approach in an unlikely setting.
The Russian School of Mathematics, in an unassuming white house with blue
shutters a block from Newton Centre, has grown rapidly since Khavinson, 50,
and another Russian emigre, Inessa Rifkin, 43, launched it three years ago.
Starting with only a handful of students, the two now run after-school
classes for about 360 students, ages 5 to 17. The children of Russian
immigrants make up the bulk of the enrollment.
But at a time when getting children into top colleges has become a suburban
obsession, the apparent success of the Russian School's approach - the SAT
scores of many of its students are sky-high - has begun to draw the
attention of American-born parents. Even though Khavinson and Rifkin
advertise only in Russian-language newspapers, they now teach 40 students
whose parents aren't Russian, compared with none three years ago.
''The boys would rather play basketball and soccer and do Cub Scouts - and
they do all those things. But we told them we thought this was important for
their schooling and their ability to get into college. They agreed and now
it's fun for them,'' said Kent Lucken, who recently enrolled his sons Alex,
9, and Ryan, 6.
Alex, wearing his Cub Scout uniform at the school one day last week, says he
loves that he's already studying algebra - at least five years before he'll
get it in public school. Ryan says the Russian School gives him ''fun things
to do, like subtraction.''
Khavinson says there's nothing wrong with teaching young children advanced
mathematical concepts such as algebra - in fact, she says, it's essential.
Khavinson says American schools ask too little of younger children, then
dump trigonometry on them in high school.
Russian parents who remember their own schooling agree.
''It was a surprise to me how they jump from doing nothing in middle school
to working on a pretty serious level in high school, at least at Newton
South,'' said Natalie Gershman, a Russian immigrant whose son Jeff, a
freshman at Newton South High School, attends the Russian School.
''It's too much of an expectation change all of a sudden.''
Betty Kantrowitz, a Newton South math teacher, agreed that students who are
exposed to advanced concepts at an early age do well later on. But
Kantrowitz, who has won three national awards, cautioned against lumping all
American math teachers together. And she noted that the Russian School
serves a population that is predisposed to success.
''Clearly, the students who go to the Russian School are interested in
learning more than what is being presented to them elsewhere,'' said
Kantrowitz, who has at least one student who attends the school. ''Motivated
children are always easy to teach and easy to stimulate.''
Motivated and engaged parents don't hurt, either. Rifkin recruited Khavinson
and launched the school after she realized that her eighth-grade son didn't
know that he could add fractions with different denominators. Rifkin, then a
software engineer, began tutoring him. Then she added a few of his friends.
Soon, the children of Russian immigrants were coming to her in droves
(Rifkin didn't need state accreditation to run a tutoring program).
What Americans might imagine as stereotypical Soviet-style discipline isn't
evident in Russian School classrooms: Rifkin and Khavinson don't wave
pointers menacingly or rap any knuckles. The students sit in rows of desks
and raise their hands to answer questions, just as they do in American
schools.
But there are some obvious differences. Teachers at the Russian School don't
rely on textbooks or teachers' guides - they make up their own problems, so
it's easy to speed or slow the curriculum to fit a particular group. And
they say they go deeper than just memorizing formulas.
''We don't tell kids, `This is just the formula, remember this,''' Khavinson
said. ''We try to discover the formula together, using all our previous
knowledge.''
Most important, expectations are exceedingly high.
One night last week, Rifkin asked her class of high-school students how they
did on the SAT math section.
''I got 660,'' said one red-headed boy, apparently proud of what is
generally considered an excellent score. A perfect score is 800.
But Rifkin wasn't impressed.
''That's very low,'' she said.
Rifkin gave another boy some credit for scoring 720 - considering his age.
''And you're in ninth grade? It's good,'' she said.
Photographs in the school's hallways celebrate the most successful students:
''Rita Rozenblum, SAT IIc 800/800''; ''Levon Margolin, SAT Math, 800/800'';
''Ilya Abyzov, SAT 1580/1600, 11th grade.''
Not bad for the $12.50 an hour parents pay. Younger children attend for an
hour one night a week, but older students have twice-weekly, two-hour
sessions. Students traveling long distances - some live in New Hampshire -
opt for marathon weekend classes of three or four hours.
But the Russian School isn't a mathematics sweatshop.
Rifkin and Khavinson realize their students are first-generation Americans,
not Russians, so they tolerate a certain amount of fooling around. The
students speak perfect English, wear Green Day T-shirts and flip-flops, and
engage in easy banter with their teachers.
They are all-American - but they are immigrant strivers, too.
''At first you kind of resent it,'' said Jeff Gershman, who plays three
sports at Newton South. ''But then you make friends there, and you
understand that it will help you in the long run.''
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