The Curious Academy

What we think… As much as I would love Hercules to learn Mandarin, this is clearly not the right environment for him. Following Doman’s instructions – learning should be joyous and your child should demonstrate an eagerness to learn, otherwise you should stop. Since Hercules is clearly disinterested in Mandarin, we should not force it. We still have the flexibility to continue his Mandarin sessions on Little Chinese at home where I can run the program following his interests so I’m not too concerned. In the English class, he knew all the words they flashed (because we’d already done them on BrillKids Little Reader). I was a tad concerned about the amount of repetition they did for the flash cards (since we follow the Heguru/Shichida philosophy at home which calls for less repetition of the same set of flash cards). I suppose that is the limitation of a Doman class as opposed to a regular at home program run by parents – the teachers only have two sessions a week to work with the children so they try to maximise the time with extra repetitions; in the home program, parents can do the program daily as and when the child is ready for it. At home, if your child is not interested to do lessons now, you can always come back to it later when he is ready so there is no pressure to get things done according to a set schedule. What I really liked about the Curious Academy was the physical component of their class. It was the perfect program for Hercules and I wished they would offer it as a stand alone. While I can do a reading program and a Chinese program with Hercules at home, I cannot replicate the physical program because I don’t have the equipment. For now, the only way to take the physical class is to sign up for the core program. Once your child is taking the core program, you can also sign up for the other add on programs – climbing, cooking, art, swimming, etc. In addition to the programs, they also have a couple of free play areas that are really cool. Outside, there is an obstacle course (currently not open yet), and inside, next to the reception area, is an indoor play area. So if you sign your child up for classes, you will also have free access to these terrific play areas outside of class time. I confess I’m tempted to sign up for lessons for Hercules just so he can play in their free play areas!

I think L enjoyed the class (well she enjoys every class she's ever been to) although she refused to go into the class and was screaming at the top of her lungs when I took her in (that was because she wanted to stay and play with H in the indoor playground). When she finally stopped wailing, she started participating. I think the physical activities will do her good she did most of them but not all; some she was actually afraid to try like swinging on the trapeze. But the glenn doman bit (i.e. the flashcards), I'm not sure I'm at all convinced. It's not that I don't believe in the effectiveness of flashcards, I just don't think it's the right way to teach a kid to read. I still believe in giving the kids solid grounding in phonics. Besides, I don't really need L to know how to read at this age. Learning how to read is not my main objective. But I must say I'm pretty impressed with L's memory. One thing for sure, my little L's concentration is amazing. When the teacher was flashing the word cards, she was the only one concentrating. After flashing the cards once, the teacher actually tested the kids by holding up 2 cards and asking the kids which card showed the word she said (e.g. she held out the words 'winter' and 'snow' and asked which one is 'winter'). Both times she tested L, L got both words correct. I'm not sure if she just fluked it, but the teacher was pretty amazed. I'm actually quite torn with my decision on the one hand I like the place, I like the physical component of the class and I would love to get L into the other non glenn doman programmes they have; on the other hand it's pretty expensive (and crazy) to pay a premium for glenn doman when all I wanted was the physical / gym component. I could easily join the Little Gym or Flykidz for half the price.