> So spending say 5 years, noodling around with abstract mental concepts and ending with symbols that turn out to be manipulatable and useful in a mathematical

> So spending say 5 years, noodling around with abstract mental concepts and ending with symbols that turn out to be manipulatable and useful in a mathematical way means, you haven’t done math until year 6 starts? Yes, that's right. Until you write down the symbols you quite literally haven't done the math.