Early indications suggest that many U.S. students taught with textbooks imported from Singapore do perform better in math. Some children who once found the subject frustrating say they now like it.

American children are falling behind their Asian peers in science and math, a shift that could push still more white-collar jobs offshore as the next generation graduates.

Critics assert that math teaching has been dumbed down in the U.S. over the past two decades. They say that too much emphasis is placed on making the subject accessible and fun and not enough on vital, if repetitive, drills such as multiplication tables. Another big criticism: U.S. math curricula tend to cover plenty of subject areas but not in sufficient depth.

While rote learning plays a part, kids in Singapore also learn to use visual tools to understand abstract concepts.

The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics in the U.S. suggests that it might not be possible to copy what Singapore's done simply by importing its books. The success of its math program may have roots in Singapore's highly disciplined culture, where the entire community -- particularly parents -- expects kids to buckle down and work hard, argues the NCTM.

Tuesday, Boston College will release a four-year global study that is expected to show the math gap with Asia remains. The college's last study, the 1999 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), ranked eighth-graders in Singapore the best in math, while U.S. kids came in 19th, just behind Latvia. American kids also fall further behind the longer they're in school; as fourth-graders, American kids ranked 7th on the 1995 study.

Enrollment by U.S. citizens or permanent residents in graduate science and engineering programs, meantime, dropped 10 percent between 1994 and 2001. Enrollment of foreign students grew 35 percent.

By grades seven and eight, kids in the Singapore program are doing high-school-level algebra.

Singapore's math program doesn't come with guides that walk teachers through every step of the class, and every problem, as many U.S. courses do. Teachers can't flip to the back of the book for answers.

Another hurdle that could limit the appeal of the Singapore method is the U.S. obsession with standardized testing. Kids taking Singapore math might be better at a core set of subjects such as multiplication, fractions, word problems and algebra, but they may struggle with topics that appear on state tests.