Meet the Instructor

After studying maths and computer science at university, I had worked as a software engineer before taking 13 years out to be with my young children. But the time had now come to find a job and my computer knowledge was more than a little out of date!

 

A few years earlier a friend had mentioned Kumon as a possible career move, and now I looked at it in a bit more detail. It seemed perfect – working with children, doing maths (always my favourite subject) and helping children learn to enjoy reading (our house is coming down with books!). It was also flexible and part-time!

 

Add to this the thought of helping to build lasting confidence and self-belief, developing excellent concentration skills and habits, teaching perseverance and study skills and I saw Kumon as adding up to a very powerful way to help each child reach their full potential.

 

I also liked the fact the Kumon was individualised – there is no "right" or "wrong" level for them to work at. Each child can work at their own place, without the rest of a class moving on before thy have grasped the basics.

And so the Ballyhackamore Centre opened in November 2005 with only one student – my youngest daughter! It was great to have a guinea pig starting at level 7A in both Maths and English. I am sure that I learnt more than my daughter and continue do so as she works through the levels. From that small beginning the centre has grown month by month to a total of just over 100 students. The journey to date has been exciting, exhausting, and full of wonderful students and families.

 

The centre has been privileged to have almost a 50-50 split between girls and boys, and a 60-40 split between maths and English. Recently, almost a third of the students are at secondary school level and the variety of age and ability makes life so much more interesting. I have several students in P1 and others sitting their GCSE's!

 

But the progress of the students is what makes the hard work worthwhile, whether that was in seeing our first student join the G-league in May 2007, or watching a 9 year old boy grasp the principals of phonics and improve his reading beyond our hopes. Or just simply doing feedback and watching the smile on a child's face as they mark off more sets as mastered!