Is It Possible to Have Too Much Math?

sbjdorlo
Mon, 17 Mar 2014 15:17:49 +0000

And of course, OP, it sounds like your kid is into a lot of great stuff which is, well, great!

While my son loved math and still does, he also did lots of other stuff to keep him busy-he had to, really, cause he was/is adhd and really, really had a lot of energy. I remember him taking some weekend monthly math classes at a local CC when he was 7. They were just focused on things like fractions, algebra, and the like. He would sit for the two hour class (I was in there, too, as it was for all ages) but after that, he would need to get about 4 hours of energy out! It wasn’t until he began to play chess at age 8 that he slowly began to learn to concentrate and sit still.

I never even thought about college or the future, to be honest, until my son was 11 and my third child was born, and since he was a ton of work, I decided to outsource all my mathy kid’s math through the local CC so I could have more time with my new one.

My mathy kid began college applications twice early. Once after 8th grade (he had strong 8th grade SAT and SAT II scores) and once after 10th grade, he began applying to two local colleges but both times, we didn’t feel it was right. Ultimately, he did not want to attend any local colleges or any state uni or UC schools. He made a great decision in waiting until he was 17 to apply to colleges full time. We and he wanted more time with him at home.

So, in addition to competitive chess, my son also was a serious violinist, a competitive bowler and a serious baseball player. He also began working as a tutor in his freshman or sophomore year and did a lot of paid violin work, too.

Because he was so occupied with social and non-academic stuff in addition to the academics of school and academic competitions, he was quite satisfied to not attend college early. Was he challenged academically? No. Was that ok with him? He says yes.

For another type of student, though, who is focused, knows what he/she wants, and lives and breaths academics, or one who doesn’t live in a great city with lots of opportunities like we do, doing full time early college may be necessary to keep the fires burning.

Lots of really mathy/sciency kids do go full time early and it seems to be a great decision as evidenced by the links posted by ucb.

GFG, I suppose some colleges have a problem with too many credits (though I accrued but the top schools seem to be a lot more flexible and open, and certainly, not all of them take transfer credits. Some kids just begin with upper division or graduate level classes upon arrival.

OP, your child will probably branch out in interests, too. My son fell in love with physics when he was 12 and was able to audit some upper division physics classes at the local state uni in 11th and 12th and even did some research there. He ultimately decided to just major in math and not double major but he is currently a TA in a physics class and really enjoys that, so he gets the best of both worlds, I guess.

mathmom, I’m going to read the book this week and give it to my less mathy son, too. :-)

I agree with IJustDrive-AoPS and the free Alcumus are great resources and very different from even EPGY.