I knew I raved about its effectiveness a long while back when my boys were still young and in kindy. I'm stillnot saying that it is not good but... yes, it has some 'Buts' now.In my earlier post, I have quite a few comments from my readers about their opinion on Enopi and their recommendation of some other. Thanks so much :) !
Now that my boys are now older, I have to review some points here. At the start, Enopi for very young kids like 4 years and kindy has certainly helped them. My kids are still going there but Im having second thoughts for my eldest, Ryan now in Standard 3... and perhaps at later stage for Raymund who is now at Standard 1. Ryan is still practicing some additions and substractions but his school has gone much advance. The worse part is the method is not aligned to his school's. Children at this stage, if they can recognize that there are more ways to work out the Maths, it's good but I seriously think that it is expecting too much of them.
I'm planning to pull Ryan out of Enopi soon but Im leaving Rachel and Raymund there still. Enopi still gives them a good foundation. The practical skills in critical thinking and problem solving are also very useful and makes future comprehension of Maths easier. However, when the child moves to primary schools, there are obvious distinction in the teaching methods. I find my boys esp Ryan going on 2 different routes in learning Maths - in school and at Enopi. To say the least, Enopi is not helping with his everyday Maths needs for his school. And worse, I am beginning to notice that both his interest and performance in Maths is sliding. Is that what we want at this stage? Yes, if my child is super intelligent. At his point Ryan is really struggling. My experience when I was coaching his school work and Enopi is that the methods for each are trully not aligned and teachers in school are very adamant to use THEIR method. So, why stress my boy to learn 2 varying methods??
To point it out further, kids nowadays are already stress as it is with high level of difficulty in school (compared to my time really!) and time is not enough as it is. I for one have no intention of adding unnecessary stress to them.
Having said that, I am NOT degrading the importance of Enopi. Specifically for my kids, I feel that they have truly benefited at younger age and I'm still sending my youngest there to build her foundation. I still have no regrets over my decision to enroll them at Enopi at the younger age. But, I feel that I can put my older boy's time to better use and align it with his school's studies. Mathematics is a very important subject. At least, I'd want to reinforce his school studies instead of taking him to a different route. Moreover, he is still a banana going thru big challenges of a SJKC, both academically and emotionally.. sigh! That's another story.
Joanne
