OverParenting

I just finished reading a very interesting book called “Outliers: The Story of Success”. The author, Malcolm Gladwell, takes a unique look on external or community factors contributing a person’s success. He suggests that successes are a form of accumulated advantages. Successful people are given extraordinary opportunities to practice more [...]

Happy Mother’s Day! I have a gift for all mothers. My new site, Project2020.WikiSpaces.Com launched today. It contains links to free and great education materials on the Internet for K-12 students.
When my kids started school, I made a conscience decision for them to attend public schools. I used materials [...]

I actually have three sons. My godson is currently a 5th grader. He is very bright and just started his endeavor in math competitions. His team will compete in the Washington State Math Olympiad. I just dug out the training materials for him.
Here are problems from the past.
1997-1998 http://home.blarg.net/~math/wsmc/prior.html
1999- [...]

A recent article on New York Times, “Education Is All in Your Mind” embodies what I have been searching for when I started this blog. Several experiments quoted in the article showed that it does not necessarily take a lot of money to produce better students. A simple way is to just convince [...]

This is an interesting article from the latest Stanford Magazine. The admission officers shared some of their favorite opening lines of college application essays from students who were admitted.
http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2008/sepoct/features/essays.html.

The Art of Problem Solving website now features great Math books for students from age 2 to college. It is a simple, effective and complete sequence for developing solid math skills.

The best kept secret of successful parents is revealed in this Scientific American article – The Secret of Raising Smart Kids. Hint: Don’t tell your kids that they are. More than three decades of research shows that a focus on effort—not on intelligence or ability—is key to success in school and in life.

There is a group of young mathematicians starting the Seattle Infinity Math Circle. They have shown impressive results in the MathCounts competition this year. Please check the website for participation.

This post is for parents of young children. My manager, a MIT graduate, told me about how his 5-year-old daughter learned to read. He and his wife read to her daily. Through that the child developed a natural interest in reading and wanted to learn more on her own. She visited the [...]

I was told that students who read New York Times do well on SAT critical reading section. There is a nice feature on New York Times website. If you double-click on a vocabulary word, it will pop up its dictionary entry. It is very helpful for improving verbal and reading skills. [...]