Comments on: How to Give Your Child an Expensive Private Education — For Less Than $3,000 per Year

By: A Boy and His Dog

A Boy and His Dog — Thu, 11 Sep 2014 03:36:30 +0000

Dan, between this and your earlier comment about education, your story is inspiring. Very useful info, speaking as a motorcycle enthusiast with small children…

By: Dan Kurt

Dan Kurt — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 23:03:25 +0000

My son was “finished” in Math by me during his High School years. His 9th grade math teacher was a dolt and the book a joke as had been his 8th grade one. I bribed him to do a long course of math for me after school 5 or 6 days a week year round except for our annual vacation to Hawaii and other long weekend holidays. He accepted the bribe which was traveling to bike races — he competed as a junior licensed racer and actually won one race against men aged 18 to 30 during those years, a 65 mile CAT 3 event when he was 17. He competed in dozens of races across many states and in Canada.

His job was to do the Saxon series of books: Algebra 1/2, Algebra 1, Algebra 2, Advanced Math, and Calculus. Each lesson was doing a bit of reading and then about 30 problems. I did not teach him. My job was to check the answers from the answer sheet provided and rarely try to solve a problem. In all of the books we only were stumped less than a handful of times by a problem. After he got into the swing of things he rarely needed any help and always, it seemed, polished off the problem set swiftly. Saxon constantly repeats problem types from earlier in the books. BTW, I have a hard science background including a doctorate and two post docs. But any reasonably intelligent individual could do what I did with my son if the student is bright and motivated: the Saxon books are that good.

My son benefited from the ordeal as he is now a Ph.D. level Mechanical engineer.

By: Isegoria

Isegoria — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 11:59:17 +0000

Strong’s recommendation is to practice math a couple hours per day, but to receive coaching only a couple hours per week.

Also, it’s not a new article, and I believe the costs are out of date.

By: Scipio Americanus

Scipio Americanus — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 10:26:24 +0000

I tutored various subjects for a while in between jobs. The average rate was around $45/hr. I never saw anyone advertise under $30/hr. I wonder if his numbers are out of date.

By: Spandrell

Spandrell — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 08:15:43 +0000

I wonder if he’s tried that on his children with the Senegalese entrepreneur.

By: James James

James James — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 06:39:09 +0000

“2–3 hours” maths “each day”

“$25 per hour. Two days of mathematics coaching would thus be $50 per week”

I’m confused. Is that only one hour of maths per day for two days a week? I’d have thought one would need more, and would therefore need to spend more.