For what it’s worth, math can be taught very linearly, but I think it can be explored and approached many different ways. I did the same thing, the teachers would say “I don’t know how, but you got the right answer”.
I kind of wish we leaned more into the way individual kids intuitions of math worked, I think you could teach the foundations much faster that way.
3-5 is mostly arithmetic and intro to word problems anyway, I’m awful at arithmetic but it doesn’t affect doing any of the important parts of math.