The economic use of time and effort in the teaching and learning of mathematics

I start with two statements: 1. The learning of very young children before they enter school is impressive. 2. The learning of those same children, later on when they are in secondary school, is less impressive. With respect to the first, newly born children cannot walk, speak in their first language, control their bowel movements, feed themselves, throw and catch things,…, etc. The list goes on. For the second, I look at the mathematics curriculum at the end of primary school and compare this with the end of high school and the difference does not seem so profound. Of course, there are many other subjects as well but overall I find myself far more impressed with the learning which takes place in a child’s first few years (see Hewitt, 2009, for how observation of this has helped me reflect upon my practice).