The Matthew principle

I have been reading Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Outliers”. Malcolm Gladwell is a journalist and economist who writes popular texts on the way the world really works, as opposed to the way we suppose it works. In this book he observes that Canadian ice hockey stars have a strong tendency to be born in January, February or March. This effect is known as the “Matthew Effect” from the Bible verse Matthew 25:29 “For unto everyone that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance, but from him that hath not shall be taken even that which he hath.” He argues that because of the age group cut off date of January 1st children who are born in the first three month of the year tend to be more physically mature and therefore able than the rest of the children with whom they play hockey. Therefore, they are the best of their year, so they get the encouragement, they get the extra training opportunities, and more practice. By the time they reach puberty, they are better than those children who were born later in the year simply because they have had access to encouragement, better training, and more practice.
The effect of maturity is evident in Maths also. Those pupils who are a little more mentally mature and whose minds capture the essence of how maths works early on, become good at maths. Those that don’t don’t. Maths is a pyramid, so much of the later work is predicated on a knowledge of the early stuff. If the basics are not firmly in place, then not only does the child not receive encouragement, more attention and better training, but also is handicapped by an inability to access the subsequent parts of the maths curriculum.
Puppet Maths is designed to make maths accessible to young children, so that even relatively immature children can relate to the concepts of the subject. We make maths fun.