Singapore Math, Explained: Why Singapore Kids Top the World

Singapore's kids top the world in maths. Or "math", if you're American. We'll allow it.

For almost thirty years, on the two biggest school tests on the planet, this tiny island has been at or near the top. And the secret isn't a genius gene. It's partly... this rectangle.

America buys it. England funds it. And one puzzle from Singapore broke the internet.

First, a real word problem, given to Singapore eleven-year-olds in a study. A cow weighs 150 kg more than a dog. A goat weighs 130 kg less than the cow. Together: 410 kg. How heavy is the cow? Only 37% of them got it right. So, no pressure.

By the end of this video, you'll solve it with a rectangle. I'm Darren. I grew up inside this system, and I have questions. How good are they, really? Where did it come from? How does it work? And why is the world copying it?

Chapter one. The result. Two giant international tests: TIMSS, for kids around ten and fourteen, and PISA, for fifteen-year-olds. The World Cup of maths. Twice.

The very first TIMSS, 1995: Singapore's fourteen-year-olds came first, way ahead of everyone. The latest, 2023: first again, at both ages. In between, a few second and third places. Which, in my family, would have meant a very long dinner.

PISA 2022: Singapore first, with 575 points. The rich-country average: 472. By the OECD's own rough rule, 20 points is about a year of learning. So, do the maths. PISA 2025? Second, behind four Chinese provinces tested as one team. The horror.

And it isn't a few geniuses. 41% of Singapore's fifteen-year-olds reached PISA's top two levels. The rich-country average: 9%.

So, is it genes? A 2005 study for the US Department of Education: "It is unreasonable to assume that Singaporean students have mathematical abilities inherently superior to those of U.S. students." Thank you. I think. So if it isn't the kids, it's the teaching.

Chapter two. Origins. 1979. A government report on Singapore's schools found "high education wastage" and "low levels of literacy". Too many kids dropping out. So a new team was set up to write new textbooks, including one called Primary Mathematics.

They tested about 17,000 pupils on word problems. With keywords like "altogether" or "left", 87% got it. Without them: 46%. They weren't reading the problem. They were hunting for magic words.

So in 1983, a team led by Dr Kho Tek Hong found a fix: draw the problem. Not the cows. The quantities. As rectangles. They called it the model method. The world calls it the bar model.

It echoes the psychologist Jerome Bruner, who said kids learn by doing, then picturing, then with symbols. Singapore calls it concrete, pictorial, abstract. And today's syllabus names George Polya's four steps for solving any problem.

By 1990, it all had a shape. Literally. A pentagon. Problem solving in the middle. Around it: concepts, skills, processes, attitudes, and metacognition. Thinking about your thinking. The goal was never the answer. It was solving problems you've never seen.

Chapter three. How it works. Four toy cars, plus six more. First you hold them. Then you draw them. Then it's just four plus six is ten. Concrete, pictorial, abstract.

Then, the number bond. Ten is seven and three. So eight plus five? Take two to make ten, then three more. Thirteen. A lot of parents abroad met this in their kid's homework. And had questions.

Now, the bar. Sally saved $156. John saved $34 less. Draw both bars. The gap is $34. So, take it away: $122.

Harder. Danny had four times as much money as Peter. Danny gave Peter $600, and now Peter has four times as much as Danny. How much altogether? The trick: the total never changes. Five units before, five units after. Peter went from one unit to four. Three units: $600. Total: $1,000. No algebra. You're welcome.

Now, our cow. The dog is one unit. The cow is a dog plus 150. The goat is a dog plus 20. Three units plus 170 is 410. One unit: 80. The cow: 230 kg. Told you. Rectangle.

The other half of the secret: fewer topics, much deeper. That 2005 study: Singapore covered about 15 topics a grade. Some US states, up to 39. A year of Singapore's books: 42 lessons. A popular American series: 164. And no re-teaching, "because students are taught to mastery the first time around."

When one American school switched, a kindergarten teacher had to spend a whole lesson on the number one: "Talk about the number 1 for 45 minutes? I was like, I don't know. But then I found you really could."

Then, in April 2015, a Singapore maths puzzle broke the internet. Cheryl's birthday. Ten possible dates. Albert is told the month, Bernard the day. Albert: I don't know, but Bernard doesn't either. Bernard: now I know. Albert: so do I.

The world was told it was for ten-year-olds. Newspapers everywhere ran it. Plot twist: it was from a maths olympiad for fifteen-year-olds. May and June go. Then the fourteenths. Then August. July 16th.

Chapter four. The world copies. 1997. A family moves from Singapore to Oregon and finds their first-grader's maths "underwhelming". So they sell Singapore's textbooks from home. That became Singapore Math Inc. Americans called it Singapore Math. We just called it maths.

In one Massachusetts district, pilot students scoring advanced went from 13% to 45%. In Maryland, it worked only where the teachers were trained.

England went further. From 2014, its maths teachers flew to Shanghai, and Shanghai's flew to England. Then up to £41 million for "maths mastery" in 8,000 primary schools. By 2024, over 70% of them had signed up to some of it.

So, did it travel? Honestly... a bit. England's big trial: about a month of extra progress. Small, said the researchers. And France's maths report: these things are "not transferable" from one country to another.

Which tells you the real answer. It isn't the book. It's the system around it: fewer topics, taught deeper, by teachers trained to teach them.

Chapter five. The catch. Singapore families spend about 1.8 billion Singapore dollars a year on private tuition. Some of those points are earned after school. In 2021, one exam question for twelve-year-olds went viral, with parents calling it far too hard. There's pressure. No league table measures that.

So, why do Singapore's kids top the world in maths? A wake-up call. A small team with a better rectangle. Fewer topics, taught deeper, by trained teachers. And a lot of practice. The good news? The rectangle is free.

One last problem. A parent spends three times as long on the homework as the child. Together, two hours. The parent's part? Ninety minutes. Maybe draw the bar together next time. Save this for homework night. And tell me: did you get the cow?