CHESTERFIELD, Mo. — A TikTok video of a 6-year-old Chesterfield boy doing advanced math equations in his head went viral Friday night.
Nathan Katcher, a first grader within the Parkway School District, took over his mom's TikTok account, and it has since been renamed to "Nathan the number kid."
The videos on TikTok show Nathan listening to his parents read equations. Nathan quickly solves the problem. His answers are correct without the use of a pencil and paper.
Nathan's mom, Rachel Katcher, said her son's video went viral overnight with more than 36,000 views.
Her son's love of numbers was realized between 3 and 4 years old during the COVID lockdown, Rachel said.
"We counted up to 6,000 over the course of a few weeks, and at 5 years old, he started adding and writing his numbers up to 10,000," she said. "We started with simple math. In kindergarten, we moved to multiplication and division."
Rachel said when she asks him a math question, she can tell the numbers are coming together in his head.
In school, Nathan reportedly receives more challenging math than his classmates, but he is mainly focused on his friends, Rachel said.
"This has been a home thing," she said.
She also loves math which has given the mother-son duo a common interest.
"His favorite math is Algebra, and he has memorized all squared numbers up to 30," Rachel said.
Rachel used to teach fifth grade before becoming a mom, and she said she used a lot of those skills with Nathan, such as the box method.
"It was really all his interest and he was never forced. It has become a party trick now," Rachel said. "He enjoys the positive reinforcement and that's how it was with the TikTok videos. I started posting videos of him doing math and Nathan enjoyed seeing all the people watch him."
The family said they plan to get Nathan involved in Mathnasium.
