I think that learning French can improve a person’s creative English vocabulary because so many English words are derived from French. If you fall back on the French-origin word then your writing can not sometimes sound more creative and interesting with barely even trying. Eg. “I’m hungry“ = je faim > I’m famished. “A kind face” > un visage gentil > a gentle visage.

My 6 year old is in Grade 1 and hasn’t ever received maths homework because all they do is reading books and writing words.


So I’ve started teaching him arithmetic sums myself. He can handle 15 questions on a page twice a day but gets tired and irritable at any more than that.

How many maths questions do Singapore kids answer daily? How many do Kumon and soroban classes require done daily?

Joining Scouts is a good way to get involved in nature as well as make new friends, learn about teamwork and leadership. The best part is that when they go camping you don’t have to organise it all yourself as a family, because the organisation does it.

No problem with a place aiming to make a profit, or having whatever belt system it wants. Brazilian jujitsu is profit-driven and produces world class ground fighters; wrestling isn’t profit driven and also produces world class ground and standing fighters. One has a belt system, the other doesn’t.


It’s only when an unnecessarily complex belt/ranking system develops with the real purpose of just extracting extra money that I think it’s worth thinking about. I’m not saying all TKD places are exploiting their students, but a number of them always are.

But many parents and students don’t have much knowledge about martial arts in general so their first question is “how long will it be until my child becomes a black belt?”, rather than “how effective is this martial art for (self defence/ athleticism/ aesthetically-pleasing/ whatever reason they’re looking for)? What proof is there? How long does it usually take until we reach it?”). My son did a trial lesson in a McDojo and I don’t think most of the parents there really care; they feel good and have a black belt and that’s probably their main criteria. The McDojo never enter competitions or even allow sparring, so they won’t know how much they lack in skill and ability, but that doesn’t stop the place constantly charging extra for tests for constantly extra levels.

Point is that the belt system can be abused to make money for the business rather than the needs of the student. Serendipity wrote that more levels have been recently introduced and those have to be paid for, and Chiefkiasu said of courise it’s a cash grab. I’m just agreeing,


Nothing wrong with a martial arts system with lots of levels of belts per se. When they have to pay for frequent tests to upgrade (like recently invented additional tests) then one can ask themselves if all those chargeable tests are actually needed, and indeed whether they might be in a McDojo.

Coloured belts and levels aren’t some ancient system. They were invented in the 20th century under judo, the system was then adopted by some martial arts but not all. Highly effective martial arts like boxing, wrestling, Muay Thai, kickboxing, MMA and sambo don’t have any belt system and they produce high quality students. Effective martial arts like jujitsu and judo have belts but they’re not frequently upgrading and so the there’s no profit motive behind it; getting to a Brazilian jujitsu black belt is really hard and takes many years to attain without having to pay a lot to get there.

Just another way to earn money. TKD seems to be a belt factory wherever you go though so it’s unavoidable. I guess I was comparing it to those martial arts where upgrading to higher belts is less frequent, with fewer belts, and much harder to progress because they’re not designed to make extra money from parents and students.


How many belt levels does a child need? In Japan, children who do judo are never even given a belt beyond white and judo is the martial art that invented the coloured belt system.

In Japan, judo kids don’t even have any coloured belts. It’s white or black.


When people ask how long it takes to get a black belt they’re looking at it the wrong way. The longer it takes to get a black belt, the more meaningful it is and the more useful the martial art.

Ask any experienced martial artists around and they’ll say judo, wrestling and bjj are the best martial arts you can do for grappling, then Muay Thai, kickboxing or boxing for striking.

My son’s belt upgrades are free. A new tip or belt is only given when the coach thinks the child has progressed enough to earn it. It took my son’s class one year before any of them progressed to a yellow belt. The teachers see what level the child’s at so in my opinion there’s no reason to be charging fees for belt upgrades, and definitely not for frequent belt upgrades.


If a martial arts place has a high turnover of students, then what does that say about them? My child’s gym hasn’t lost a single student in the year he’s been there; the only kids who disappear from his class are the ones who have progressed to the older kids group.

Why not try teaching abacus to your child by yourself? It’s very easy to learn.


I’ve ordered a $3 soroban from eBay and whilst I’m waiting for it to arrive in the post I’m teaching my 5 year old to count on his fingers like a soroban (thumb represents 5). He loves “helping me” solve my counting problems by advising me what to do when I run out of fingers (“use the other hand!”). He’s starting to use his fingers the soroban way, but young children are still learning finger coordination so it’s a lot harder for them than it is for adults who take it for granted.

I initially planned on enrolling him in a soroban course but I figured I don’t need to pay someone so much money to teach basics like 2+2 and 7+8. Once the child knows the basics it should be easy to apply the same logic for larger numbers. It takes years of repetition for it to become second nature, so it’ll cost thousands of dollars in course fees to actually get good at it. I’ve asked mathematicians at university what they think of it and they all say they think that’s a waste of money. ‘Real maths’ is about problem solving according to them, not doing basic arithmetic fast.

Abacus is being promoted as a kind of brain enrichment program, but a child’s brain will be enriched by just about any non-passive activity.

So why are parents spending so much money and time on abacus courses? Some children mentioned on this forum are doing these classes when my child’s fast asleep, and one reason I do this is because scientists say that lots of sleep is important for a child’s mind and body.