erich - I am not biased. I just gave my personal experience and pointed out the fact that over there starting with academics later did not negatively affect the future results. I am not really trying to compare medal counts. Besides, the country has 10 million people (used to have just under 15 million before the split) doesn't quite compare to Russia, USA or China. The truth is, there were and are plenty of gifted people who never suffered due to lack of early academics.
I do believe in exposing all kids and especially gifted kids who crave to learn and explore to the outside world as much as possible so they can absorb all the information and knowledge they want but I don't necessarily believe they need to do that in a formal pre-school setting.
Please do some simple fact check before elaborate the argument. We have countries similar the size of CZE produced tremendous math talents:
Hungary 77 IMO gold metals,
Romania 73,
Bulgaria 53,
Korea 50,
Vietnam 46.
Unfortunately, CZE ranked closer to these following countries in terms of math talent performance: Argentina, Peru, Mongolia, Georgia, Greece, and Mexico. If you are not biased, please compare math education in CZE to those countries.
http://www.imo-official.org/results_country.aspx?column=awards&order=desc
