In recent times, there have been tons of viral videos and social media posts featuring children who are not just showing the world how cute they are but their incredible talents. Through various acts of singing, dancing, writing, solving complex equations or being philanthropic, these children have been the biggest and most active on the internet.
Whether deliberately or not, their actions have provided some sort of encouragement and relief and it is almost impossible not to love them.
Five-year-old Nyame is making a name for herself as an academic genius who can impressively solve math problems. In a video shared by her dad, a Ghanaian-born plastic surgeon changing lives in Charlotte, Nyame is seen tackling a pre-algebra or orders of operation problem. Pre-algebra obviously prepares a student to take algebra and then go on to upper-level math. Students may find it difficult to take upper-level math courses if they lack a good foundation in pre-algebra, experts say.
Nyame doing pre-algebra has gone viral on social media particularly TikTok, with people left in awe of her amazing skills.
“I use these problems to diagnose areas of weakness in her math skills. She completed multiplication when she was four so I am looking to see if she can recall her multiplication facts quickly. If she is slower with multiplication then I create lessons to go back and review that,” her dad, Dr. Theodore Nyame, says after sharing the video.
The Harvard-trained board-certified plastic surgeon specializing in aesthetic and reconstructive surgery has been homeschooling his two kids for some time now. Many families have already been practicing homeschooling for decades but the practice has seen a big increase due to COVID-19. Before COVID, around 2.5 million U.S. children in grades K–12 were being homeschooled. Just one year later, that number has nearly doubled, a study says.
Parents choose to homeschool their kids for lots of reasons, but freedom and the fact that they can have more control over what their kids are learning are usually the top reasons. Dr. Nyame, who believes in parent-directed education in the home, immigrated to the U.S. at the age of eight without knowing how to read or write. Born in Mpraeso, a town in Ghana’s Eastern Region, his journey to becoming one of the most highly rated plastic surgeons in America and a successful family man was not smooth sailing.
Determined to make it in life in spite of the difficulties, he took his studies seriously and today he is doing amazingly well in the field of surgery and as a family man. To make sure his kids also grow to become fulfilled and well-balanced people, he sacrifices a lot of his own free time to teach them from home.
Talking about his daughter doing pre-algebra, he says, “she more recently completed division so I am assessing how quickly she can recall her division facts. The time it takes to answer 27/9 informs me that she knows her division facts but math speed drills would be helpful to allow her to recall them faster.”
Dr. Nyame also teaches a course on pivotal lessons from his career in medicine on LegacyShift, an edtech platform that makes it easy to learn and grow with the help of influential mentors who reflect the lives and experiences of minorities or people of color. The well-known and highly-trained plastic surgeon shares on LegacyShift how he worked his way up to where he is today and the significant lessons he’s learned including the need for homeschooling.
