American parents are sending their kids to 'Russian math' (2017)
Lots of comments asking what is &quot;Soviet&#x2F;Russian Math&quot; actually like, and how is it different.<p>I was lucky to get an education in three systems (Soviet Math, Romanian Math School (influenced by both French and Soviet Math school), and finally in a world top 40 university in North America.<p>I would summarize the Soviet&#x2F;Russian Math&#x2F;Physics approach like this:<p><pre><code>  - understanding of the mechanism&#x2F;intuition behind the equations&#x2F;methods is paramount
  - teachers are astute at spotting students who memorize blindly, and will intervene to correct that
  - while rigorous about notation, the mathematical representation always comes after understanding, not before
  - the progression of teaching (order how material is introduced) is very well thought out
  - the old soviet textbooks are generally less verbose than North American ones (less fancy), but high quality in their expression, typesetting, and ESPECIALLY (!!!) the quality of the exercises
  - the Soviet Math textbook exercises are something to behold: they have funny&#x2F;memorable setting (like jokes), they are short and easy to express, the numbers are chosen in such a way that the result will be a nice whole number, or pi, etc. Basically as a kid you can read one of those problems, lay down, close your eyes, and work on it in your head.
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That being said, I did like some of the aspects from the so called &quot;Western Math&quot; (in my case Canadian university):<p><pre><code>  - teachers are more approachable, more friendly
  - textbooks can be gorgeous (nice colorful plots, etc)</code></pre>