Continually pursuing potential: The 60 years of Kumon

Concerned that her 8-year-old son, Takeshi, didn’t do as well as she had expected in a grade 2 maths test. Teiko told this to her husband, Toru Kumon, who was then a high school mathematics teacher, who then decided to make worksheets to help his son gradually improve his calculation skills.

Toru had Takeshi complete these worksheets every day and hand them back for marking. Every day, Takeshi would then have to correct his mistakes on the previous worksheet, as well as complete the new worksheet which Toru assigned him.
These were the precursors of today’s Kumon worksheets. By studying them Takeshi advanced from relearning addition in grade 2, to proficiently learning differential and integral calculus in grade 6.

“Thanks to this learning method, I didn’t have to study maths at home at all when

I was a junior and senior high school student. It was enough for me if I just listened to lessons in schools,” Takeshi once said about his experience as the first Kumon student.

“Another result of my Kumon study was the realisation that I could master unknown content that I had not been taught.”

Founding & expansion

Encouraged by Takeshi’s success, Toru and Teiko Kumon, Takeshi’s mother, started a maths centre at home in 1955 and invited children from the neighbourhood to study with them. About ten children turned up.

The Kumon Method helped all of these children learn and grow. Toru wanted to expand this method as he believed that while each and every child has great potential, they need to be taught how to harness it. Therefore, the company, Osaka Institute of Mathematics, was officially founded in 1958 in Osaka, Japan.

In 1962, the company The Osaka Institute of Mathematics Ltd was incorporated and by 1969, the total number of subject enrolments exceeds 10,000.

In 1974, Kumon made began its overseas expansion by opening its first Centre in New York, followed by Taiwan in 1975, Brazil in 1977 and Germany in 1979.

Kumon then expanded further from the 1990s through to the 2000s. In total, Kumon is now present in more than 50 countries and regions around the world.

60 years on ­– is Kumon still relevant?

Fast forward to 2018, when Kumon celebrates its 60th anniversary, one might wonder if the pencil and paper approach of Kumon is still relevant with the prevalence of technology. After all, technology has given birth to numerous apps that promises learning without the need of a face-to-face session with an instructor or teacher. However, as every child is different, so the ways to guide a student on their worksheets differs from student to student as well.

Having twice weekly face-to-face sessions allows Kumon Instructors the opportunities to observe the students doing the work, understanding their thought process and study habits. These will help Instructors gauge the “just-right” level for the students and the way to instruct them. While we embrace technology, the face-to-face interaction between students and Instructors is still an indispensable aspect of the Kumon Method and will continue to stay relevant in the 21st century today.

Why the ‘just-right’ level matters, in sport and study

The Kumon Method of Learning has many components working together to develop the potential of each individual child. But of all these features, which is the most important?

According to Kumon’s late founder, Toru Kumon, it is the ‘just-right’ level of study.

“The ‘just-right’ level of study is the most important element of education, because each and every child should be given learning materials that match his or her ability. The reason children come to dislike studying is because they are not given what is at the ‘just-right’ level for their academic ability. When they are given what is ‘just-right’ for them, they enjoy studying. They will then be able to advance beyond their school grade level”, Mr. Kumon wrote in 1995.

But what does the jargon, ‘just-right’ level, really mean? It refers to the sweet spot in difficulty that motivates a student to do his or her best; not too easy, otherwise students get bored, but not too hard as well. In sports, players are assigned the right position for them based on their skills and abilities. If the incorrect position is assigned, even the most talented player will underperform, at best.

One example of this can be seen in soccer. While playing for Juventus Football Club, striker Thierry Henry was assigned to play as a left winger and was expected to both organise the attack and to defend. He was overburdened and his role didn’t best suit his ability. He thus played badly and his career was severely damaged. Most of all, he was not happy.

“I wasn’t enjoying myself at all, I felt like I’d lost the desire to play football”, Henry later admitted.

Henry left Juventus after just one season to join Arsenal Football Club. It was in Arsenal where Henry was assigned the ‘just-right’ position and level of work as he was deployed as the reserve striker, where he flourished on the field. Henry later became Arsenal’s first-choice striker and would eventually be the all-time top scorer for both Arsenal and the French national team.

What’s clear now is that Henry wasn’t assigned the ‘just-right’ level at Juventus, but was at Arsenal. When he played at a pace just right for him, he excelled and enjoyed it.

“When I scored, in that moment, I rediscovered some emotions, some feelings that I had not felt in a long time,” he said.

Similar to a soccer coaches assigning the right role for each player, Kumon Instructors find the ‘just-right’ level of learning for each student. Since different children have different levels of abilities, it’s logical that the study assigned to them should be different too.

Correctly matching materials to students’ ability is integral to the Kumon Method. When students study at their ‘just-right’ level, they will begin to enjoy studying.

This is the first step towards developing their self-learning ability. As their self-learning ability matures and enjoyment of learning grows, students will be able to progress beyond their school grade.

To this day, the Kumon Method continues to use worksheets matched to each student’s ability, at the ‘just-right’ level. Kumon students largely work out solutions on their own using hints, examples and, if necessary, guidance from the Instructors.

Reading has Learning, Emotional and Social Benefits

When one is able to read for pleasure and not out of necessity, the learning, emotional and social benefits are boundless. Besides obvious benefits such as increase in general knowledge ad language proficiency, children gain a greater insight into human nature and decision making from reading books. The more children are exposed to literature, the more reading will become part of their daily life. A child is introduced to new information, concepts, and phonemic awareness with every story.

How can parents encourage their child to read?

While it may be prudent for parents to limit the time their child spends on other activities, this may not be enough to spur a good reading habit. It is more important that children continue to enjoy what they are reading. This can be achieved by choosing books that your children enjoy for as long as possible.

Depending on the child’s language skill level, give him a story to read or have a story read to them. When the story is finished, ask your child to pinpoint his favourite parts of the story. This can enable children to have fun picking out words and develop an interest to move to the next page.

Children with a large collection of reading resources in their homes score higher and perform better on standardised tests. Provoke a reading habit in your child by having a large array of interesting books and magazines at their reading level.

Your response or feedback has a strong effect on how hard they will try to become good readers. Always remember to give them genuine praise for their efforts.

Advanced Student Forum (ASF) 2018

On 6 October 2018, we celebrated the accomplishments of 116 Kumon Programme Completers and 311 students who were studying five years ahead of the Kumon International Standard (KIS) at the Advanced Student Forum.

Amongst the Completers, there were three who received awards for completion of double subjects. The youngest Completers in 2018 were four primary four students who completed the English Programme.

The youngest awardees were two kindergarteners (K1) receiving the award for 5-years advanced in Mathematics.

Held at the University Cultural Centre (UCC) at the National University of Singapore (NUS), the Advanced Student Forum saw two Completers; Tan Yan Ling and Lee Yi Jing on stage to share about their journey to completion of the Kumon Programmes.

In a separate segment of the ASF, four awardees Yu ZiChen (K2), Lau Yan Ting Hannah (P2), Yap Yi Zhe (P3) and Hasif Bin Mualana Abdul Halim (P5) went on stage for a Kumon Mathematics worksheet demonstration. They demonstrated their ability with worksheet levels that were 5 years ahead and even higher, than their school grade level. At the end of the demonstration, the entire auditorium was left in visible admiration of their ability.

In his speech, Mr Masahiro Takatsu, General Manager of Kumon Singapore and Brunei conveyed to the awardees his congratulations and urged them to pursue even greater heights.

Mr Takatsu shared, “In doing one thing, never give up halfway but continue to strive until the end.  This ability to persevere on is the greatest ability and the most powerful weapon in your life. Truly, all of you have gained this greatest ability and most powerful weapon. Therefore, believe and be proud of yourself, and advance further from here”.

The Readers’ Choice Award Winning

Established since 1958, Kumon is an enrichment programme well-known for consistently pursue children’s potential. With two basic programmes which are Maths and English, Kumon has always been parents’ choice especially for the parents who wanted to try a Japanese learning method for their children. From the love between a father for his son, the Kumon Method has grown and become an effective learning method for kids. For 60 years, the Kumon Method believes in self-learning and independent approaches which can help young children in facing difficulties in their lives.

In Malaysia, there are more than 200 Kumon Centres with more than 30,000 students. We are really honoured to be recognised by most of the parents and will always look forward to furnishing their children with the ability to advance to high school level material through self-learning as early as possible. For the year of 2018, Kumon Education Malaysia has been selected as candidates for Readers’ Choice Awards by the famous parenting magazines, BabyTalk and MamaPapa. Every year, these magazines organise Readers’ Choice awards, and 2018 marked their eighth year organising this event. The organisers will invite their readers to nominate their favourite brands in several categories that they provided.

Last year, Kumon Education Malaysia has won several categories from the awards which were Best Enrichment Centre (Mathematics), Best Mathematics Programme and Best Reading Programme. Winning these awards definitely has increased our credibility among parents. It is our pleasure to serve more to all children and eventually to the society.

We also would like to express our heart-felt gratitude to all of our supporters especially our dedicated Instructors and parents. Our Instructors are really devoted to discover what individual students are capable of and bringing out their potential to the maximum. They always pay their careful attention to each student’s academic ability and personality. Our parents also play an important role in supporting their children as in Kumon, we believe in daily practices that should be applied not only in the Centre but also at the home. Undoubtedly, the commitment given by all parties have helped us in winning these awards.

Kumon Education Malaysia will continue to further develop each student’s ability and strive for something better by continuing to develop our worksheets and instruction method. As today, this learning method continues to go beyond the borders of countries, race, culture and traditions, to reach more and more countries and regions throughout the world.

Self-learning: How Kumon teaches students to teach themselves

The concept of self-learning fascinated Toru Kumon, Kumon’s late founder, throughout his entire life – even when he was a young boy. This interest catalysed when he was a fifth grader in elementary school after his maths teacher informed the class that if they were able to learn from the textbook on their own, they could advance. Toru felt happy to be able to study at his own pace and did so enthusiastically.

Mr Kumon later moved to Tosa Junior High School (equivalent to lower secondary) and was similarly exposed to a self-learning method, where the teacher taught only the basics and expected students to learn by themselves.

‘This method suited me very well. If I advanced beyond the school grade level, I would have an easy time studying in school. In addition, I didn’t like to be forced into studying or to have to listen to teachers’ lectures, so an educational policy which encourages students to learn what they liked at their own pace by themselves was just right for me.’

‘From this time forward I began to think that all the other schools should adopt this policy of achieving the greatest result with the least amount of effort, so their students can enjoy their school life more,’ Toru Kumon wrote in his autobiography Give it a try – Yattemiyo.

However, in both instances, the schools’ attempts to introduce self-learning were short-lived. Mr Kumon felt this happened because were no learning materials or appropriate methods for keeping up-to-date with students’ progress.

Mr Kumon went on to become a mathematics teacher at the very same high school he attended as an adolescent, and his strong belief in self-learning’s efficacy guided his teaching practice. His teaching was highly beneficial for students, and he would often take the time to help students with their studies after class. The overwhelming majority of the students he helped this way were able to reach senior high school level mathematics within a year.

Furthermore, Mr Kumon’s passion for helping children learn how to teach themselves led to the creation of the very first Kumon worksheets, which he trialed on his son Takeshi Kumon. After seeing how these worksheets helped his son, Toru used these worksheets to help other students.

‘For children to make progress, it is more effective to meet their desire to grow rather than for adults to force them to advance by cramming everything into their heads. There is a limit to how much you can force a child to study but the potential for growth through self-learning is endless. All children intrinsically want to develop their abilities and they all have the potential to do so. Responding to these desires, thus helping them grow without limits, not only makes the children and their parents happy but is essential for society,’ Toru wrote in Yamabiko in 1983.

Children’s own desire to grow is precisely what informs Kumon’s self-learning methodology. Instructors do not teach students in a uniform manner. Instead, examples, explanations and hints are provided in the worksheets. Students learn from these examples and attempt the questions on their own, under the watchful eyes of the Kumon Instructor, who guide the students when necessary.

But all the aforementioned are the abilities of long-term Kumon students. You, as parents, may be asking yourself how does Kumon develop the first steps of a long-term self-learning habit?

Atsushi Yamada, president of Kumon Asia & Oceania, explains that Instructors provide more guidance to newly enrolled students than to students who have been studying Kumon for a while. He says this guidance’s’ ultimate end goal is to develop students who are able, and who want to, study on their own.

‘Of course, when children first study with Kumon, it is difficult for them to do the worksheets by themselves. That is why Instructors have to provide appropriate guidance in their initial period, and ultimately, nurture them to become children who are able to learn independently and stretch their abilities further on their own,’ wrote Mr Yamada (President’s Message to Instructors, 2018).

As students grow in Kumon, their abilities grow as well and with time, they will be able to study independently. With students learning independently it is then possible for every child to progress as fast as they can at their own pace. This way, Kumon students are not held back because of age, or pushed to advance without having fully understood the concepts simply to keep up with the rest of the class. Instead, they advance only when they are ready. This will be explored further in the next issue of Potential.

Kumon was founded 60 years ago, and all through this time self-learning has remained as a central tenet. This has allowed Instructors to push the potential of each child to the fullest, not just in maths but in other subjects as well.

As Mr Kumon once wrote in The Strengths of the Kumon Method, ‘The Kumon Method enables students to advance beyond school grade level. The worksheets are well-organised; therefore this is also true in the cases of students with special needs. Children gain self-confidence and achieve an advanced level of competency, which enable them to excel in high school. Advancing beyond grade level is what is most beneficial for children. The Kumon Method has not been used solely to teach maths. Students have been able to experience self-learning and acquire the skills for self-learning through their study of maths.’