You can’t solve this
But this 12-year-old can
PaulLin can envision his son working for Google one day. For his middle child Andrew, there’s a world of opportunities — and he’s only 12 years old.
The Grade 7 St. George’s Junior School student has entered a slew of math contests and challenges dating to when he was five years old. He has since collected more than five perfect scores and seven first-place trophies. His most recent endeavour was the American Mathematics Contest 10A in February. About two weeks ago, he found out he was the youngest to score within the top one per cent.
“I was surprised,” Andrew said while on lunch break at his Dunbar school campus, his father proudly taking photos of his interview with The Province.
While his dad dreams big for his son’s career, Andrew hasn’t given it much thought.
“I really don’t know (what I want to do),” he said. For Andrew the “career question” has been coming up a lot lately — but it’s not why he enrols in competitions.
“(These contests) make you think differently than just doing my school work and writing equations — there’s a critical-thinking aspect where you can problemsolve,” he said.
And that’s where his mother, Lisa — to whom he attributes much of his success — sees the benefit.
“There are certain things that are not taught (in school) that I believe are important,” Lisa said.
Growing up in Hong Kong, she remembers a lot of school tests — something she doesn’t see happen as often here. So, from a young age, she had Andrew doing “fun activities” like logic puzzles, math and word problems.
“If you can read the questions carefully and develop a strategy it helps all subjects,” she said, adding the competitions aren’t about the results. “It’s about the process of either preparing or during the test, because when you’re sitting there: What do you do when you feel nervous? How do you use your time wisely and when you finish, how do you check over your answers carefully?”
It’s about “developing him as a whole.”
And Andrew’s process is simple enough: After completing his school work he moves on to 30 minutes of reviewing past tests. The night before a test, he makes sure he’s in bed early. And when faceto-face with the test: “I take a deep breath before I start,” he said. “That helps calm me down.”
Oh, and according to Andrew, the answer to the problem on the front page of the newspaper is 2.2.