I am sure that success awaits us on the thorny path of searching for the truth, acquiring new knowledge, skills, and personal self-development!

The development situation of modern society determines the task of developing a child’s intellectual, creative, cognitive and sensory abilities as one of the priority areas of work. The success of the state largely depends on the reasonable development of resources, the creation of innovative technologies, and the ability to build a long-term strategy for economic development. The achievement of such characteristics is directly related to the level of mathematical science in general and mathematical literacy of society in particular. It is the teaching of mathematics, technology and the development of additional education that are the most effective means of population development. And this is our main purpose!

Our enrichment school АММА is a quite well-known organization in the Russian Far East, is our educational school that specializes in teaching children calculation on the abacus and mental calculation. We are cooperated with international organizations and children’s educational centers of Taiwan, China (AIAMA (AbacusKing)), Japan (Tomoe SOROBAN), China (WAAMA), Lebanon (BrainyKids), Singapore and Malaysia. This cooperation and regular educational exchanges help us improve our methods. We provide classes not only in our school, but also outside Russia.

Our students annually participate in mental arithmetic contests, both national and international.

Our abacus and mental arithmetic teaching methods are borrowed from our colleagues in Taiwan, China and Japan, which has helped our students to achieve a high level of mastering this calculation technique. Today, the highest level of calculation on the abacus and mental calculation among the students are levels 4 and 3. Of course, not all students achieve these values. They often stop at levels 6 and 5 and finish their education, because great results require regular training, which a today’s Russian school student is not always able to do. For instance, middle school students, who have quite a high study load at school. However, 70% of our students have reached and are reaching the highest results in mental calculation due to our well-built educational system that is based on the experience of our international colleagues and, most importantly, due to the work of our teachers.

Our courses are available for children from the age of 3.5 by pre-admission testing, which allows kids to successfully fully complete the course. There are no age limits, we also work with teenagers.

We use our own literature in the teaching process. The preparation of study materials takes quite a lot of time from the formation to printing. All our teachers are involved in this process, as well as students, who help test them.

We are currently developing a separate program as part of our educational program that will supplement the mental arithmetic course.

The general education system for teaching math and algebra requires lots of students’ efforts to solve problems. Therefore, we began to develop our own unique method of teaching mental calculation overlaying the math and algebra course. While learning the abacus and mental arithmetic, our students learn and can solve the following math problems:

Problems on speed and distance

Problems on the area of plane figures

Calculations with negative numbers and percentages

Problems on the arithmetic mean value

Computation of the arithmetic mean value

Other lessons from the math and algebra course

Our goal is not only to teach children mental calculation, but also to teach them how to use this skill in class by learning certain lessons from the elementary and middle school math course. The primary goal is to teach kids to use the capabilities of both left and right brain hemisphere rationally. With the help of this study course, any potential genetically inherent in any little human being will actively develop training memory, attention and imagination.

Our main events:

Annual February Mental Arithmetic Tournament

Annual Russian and Far Eastern mental arithmetic competition THE PACIFIC CUP

Seminars and workshops for teachers and parents of the children learning mental arithmetic

These events help to form functional literacy, use knowledge in new, unusual situations, find and support talented children and young people, induce and develop leadership qualities and creative potential among students. This is also a motivation to study.

Along with the course Abacus and mental arithmetic, our school also offers other educational programs for children of different ages. Such as:

• Teaching children the strategy board game of Wei qi.

Wei qi is one of the oldest and most popular strategic intellectual games in the world, whose history goes back several thousand years. At our school, the Atari Go club is actively working. Over the past two years, our students have already shown good results in the tournaments.

• 3D modeling and additive technologies.

In classes, students learn to model various products, mechanisms and assemblies, and create drawings using 3D models.

• Robotics and programming.

Students at our school successfully master their training programs and this helps them achieve results in various fields, including engineering and scientific fields.

So, this year our students became the winners of the international competition of science and technology among young engineers “Step into the Future”. This program is implemented by Bauman Moscow State Technical University and is aimed at developing talented youth. Participants not only from Russia, but also from China, Malaysia, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Turkey, France, the USA and England took part in the competition. Our students presented their project of converting PET plastic into filament for 3D printing.

In conclusion, I would like to share with you, our achievements. This Saturday, on 20th of July 2024, we are hosted the International Competition of Abacus and Mental Arithmetic, named Pacific Cup 2024, which is taken place in the city of Vladivostok. The participants from different cities of Russia and students from nearby cities in China will take part in our event. Such events are very important and necessary for converting children to further learning abacus and mental arithmetic, motivating the child, as well as stimulating and developing students.

(This is speech by Ms. Elena Shumeiko at the Academic Exchange Meeting for Abacus and Mental Arithmetic Teachers of WAAMA on July 16th, 2024 in Changchun, Jilin, China.)