Top Banana Education Foundation is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to helping children develop a life-long love of mathematics and to providing educators with powerful new tools to help students unleash their academic potential and achieve to the best of their abilities. Top Banana teaches math to the young children by aligning the instructions in mathematics with the knowledge of how human memory works. Instead of memorizing facts, we place the emphasis on the logic behind the mathematical operations. We capitalize on the young children’s curiosity and enthusiasm, turning studying numbers into playing with numbers, and producing superior results.
American K-12 education is in need of renewal. Despite some recent improvements in standardized test scores, our students are far from ranking at the top of the scale on the international stage. Not only do American students trail behind their peers in science and history, mathematics appears to be the real weak link in our primary and secondary education as we rank in the bottom third of more than 40 countries worldwide.
We no longer live in a math-optional world. Business leaders, educators and policy makers agree that our students are not graduating with the math skills necessary to compete in an increasingly international economy that is propelled by technology. In spite of the increasing role that technology plays in our lives, our students are showing less interest in pursuing careers in engineering and other fields—in part because we haven’t given them the solid foundation in mathematics and related disciplines that are needed to make those careers attractive.
To give our children the foundation they need to succeed—at whatever they choose to do—we need to teach them not just what to learn, but how to learn. One of the most effective ways to do that is by teaching children how to learn math.
What could be a better context than math class for a student to acquire and practice the skills needed to analyze, classify, structure, measure, estimate, conclude, summarize, prove and verify? These skills are essential in any subject in school and in any line of work that a student may ultimately pursue. These skills don’t just help students succeed in math—they help students succeed in life.