Classes are taught in pleasant towns such as Belmont and Marblehead and Wellesley. — Ilya Rifkin, chief operating officer, began by contrasting it with other approaches.“The biggest difference is if you give a new [Russian math] student a problem they’ve never seen before, they will look at the problem and say, ‘I don’t know,’ ” he said.But if you give a new problem to a veteran student, he explained, “they’ll look and look and look and say, ‘I don’t know, but I have a couple of ideas.’ ”Nina Shah, 11, used a protractor at the Russian School of Mathematics in Newton.The school introduces algebra in first grade, and fundamental concepts of geometry in sixth grade — “significantly earlier” than most US schools, where the material is introduced in the sixth and seventh grades, and eighth and ninth grades, respectively, said Masha Rifkin, the school’s outreach director.The math is not taught in Russian, but many of the teachers are from the former Soviet Union and were brought up with the Soviet methodology of math education, Masha Rifkin said.And the approach, developed by Inessa Rifkin, is definitely Russian: It’s based on the theories of a Russian psychologist named As the school explains on its website, under the heading “What makes our math ‘Russian?’ ” — “Vygotsky recognized that education can stimulate intellectual development.“By specifically targeting the edge of a student’s current understanding (or his or her ‘Zone of Proximal Development’) you provide mental exercises that challenge the mind in the same way that physical exercise in sports challenges the body.”Greater Boston is filled with Russian math dropouts. Russian Math. "Dominic Nicholas: "[Our son] had some natural proclivity for math, and we wanted to have him reach his maximal potential. In Andover, Tracey Spruce and her young children fought so much about Russian math homework, and her son, then a second-grader, became so anxious about homework and class, that after a couple of years in the program the family quit.“I finally came to the conclusion that I was not willing to sacrifice my kids’ mental health for math excellence,” Spruce said.But on Sunday morning in Newton, the students were as enthusiastic as infomercial stars.“I really like learning intervals,” said Liv Davidson, 9, a third-grader at Bates Elementary School in Wellesley.“I like to learn multiplication and division,” said Christina Gabrieli, a third-grader at Dexter Southfield, a private school in Brookline.Christina’s mother, Susan Gabrieli, a scientist at the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, mentioned that three of Christina’s cousins who took Russian math are now at Harvard and a fourth has been accepted.The scene in Tatyana Bisikalo’s fifth-grade honors class was similarly buoyant. COVID update: Russian School of Mathematics - San Jose has updated their hours and services. These days, Itina helps run a thriving after-school program in Brighton called the From Newton to Brooklyn, from Dallas to San Jose, "Russian math" is a rising trend, driven by a fast-growing chain called the One of those 22,000 students is 10-year-old Liv Davidson from Wellesley, who has been coming to the Russian School of Mathematics since kindergarten.
"Inessa Rifkin, who co-founded the school 20 years ago in Newton, says that one-fifth of the town's elementary school students come to the Russian School of Mathematics these days. "The way Russians teach is that they make sure that every student, when they perform a mathematical operation, they understand Itina, at the Studio of Engaging Math, helped write some of those Russian textbooks, and now enlivens and adapts that material for children in Brighton. The school says it discounts the price when families of existing students “experience financial hardship,” but it does not offer scholarships.The school touts impressive results on its website.