Teaching Mathematics - a practical guide for parents

Teaching mathematics and encouraging our children to learn math may not be difficult even if we, as a parent, feel that we are not good in mathematics. I always feel that I am not good in math and even suffered from math anxiety during my school days. However, this did not deter me from teaching mathematics to my kids.

Several things we can do to help our children learn math:

Our attitudes toward math will have an impact on our children’s attitude. When parents show an interest and enthusiasm for mathematics, children will develop similar enthusiasm themselves.

Studies have shown that children can increase achievement when there is parents’ participation in their school or homework. Make an effort to work with the teacher to achieve common goals for your child. Children love to please their love ones especially their parents. When they see that math is important to you, they will feel it is important to them too.

Jump-start children learning in math early by engaging them in informal math activities. Extending math from classroom to home makes kids feel that math is an everyday subject and will be more interesting. This helps to lay the foundation for our children to be successful in mathematics in school levels.

Teaching will be easier if we make a conscious effort to understand how children learn.
1. Every child has his preferred learning style. Tune in to his learning preference. We can try model drawing if the child is a visual learner.

2. Children need to learn with concrete objects before they can understand abstract concepts. Math manipulatives and math games will come in handy. Let them explore and play while you coach them mathematics concepts.

3. Keep it simple and make sense to children. For example, a child will have great difficulty understanding 6 ÷ 2 = 3. Instead, I get my son to distribute 6 pieces of his favorite cake equally between him and his sister. He figures out each of them will get 3 pieces which is fair since the sister is getting the same number as him. Therefore, he is happy.

In today’s competitive world, proficiency in mathematics may help to improve a child’s college or career option. We also need to set the appropriate skills expectations that can encourage and help to build solid skills when teaching math to our children.
1. Allow them to make mistake and encourage estimation. It lets them sharpen their skills in taking calculated risk.

2. Get them to explain the “why” in addition to knowing “how”. This helps them to build and demonstrate their reasoning ability.

3. Show them problems can be solved in different ways. Train them to be a problem solver, one who finds, investigates and explores solution to problems.

Back To Kids Math Games

Return from Teaching Mathematics to Kids Activities Learning Games