Mathematics can be a complicated and difficult subject for children to understand. Eventually, this lack of comprehension can lead to anxiety, frustration, loss of focus, and demotivation. In other words, without a solid foundation, math can be a real nightmare for children. Luckily, there are numerous strategies that can enhance mathematics learning, while minimizing frustrations and struggles at the same time. If your child is growing to dislike math, read on for the top 5 ways to boost their skills and confidence, and maybe even make math interesting and fun!
- Show your child math in real life
Math is the foundation for everything we do every day – from grocery shopping, driving and cooking to playing music, creating art and doing sports. Help your child discover “the real world math” by relating it to fun activities they love and enjoy. Use math to make cookies, arrange tea parties, race toy cars, make crafts or keep score in sports. Break it down, take away the fear, and watch your child grow into a confident little mathematician.
- Try game-based learning
From a child’s perspective, math may not be the most interesting subject. Coping with numbers can be overwhelming for some children and it can get really complicated if they lose focus. Making math enjoyable and easy is the key to effective learning. Brain-training games like puzzles, chess, dominoes, sudoku, and cards will not just make math more fun, but also help you gain a deeper understanding of your child’s strengths and weaknesses. Playing together, you can get insight into how your child thinks and test their skills without them even realizing it.
- Add math to your daily routine
It’s very important to encourage your child to do a little bit of math every day, even if it’s only for a few minutes. The more they exercise, the better they will become. Simple! In order to make learning more fun, step away from the boring worksheets, and find practice elsewhere. As mentioned above, playing educational games is always a good idea. Find a challenging but fun problem-solving activity your child will enjoy and then use it to give their math skills a proper workout.
- Use interactive technology
Practicing math by hand may be irreplaceable in the classroom, but paper and pencil are certainly not the only tools that can be used to build number skills at home. Your child can take live math courses or play a variety of interactive online games, solving math riddles and getting constant practice while also having fun. Gadgets and apps can help every child learn math more effectively, regardless of their preferred learning style. If your child is a visual learner, find an app for that! If they learn better in a group, hop online and join one! Try something new and watch the learning click.
- Master the secrets of mental arithmetic
One thing that can really boost your child’s math success, whatever their age, is abacus mental arithmetic. Using the abacus, your child will learn how to visualize numbers and quickly perform mental calculations, without the help of paper and pencil, calculators, or other aids. But that’s not all! Since it stimulates the whole brain, mental arithmetic will also help your child improve their memory, speech, comprehension skills, and also increase their attention span and reaction speed. Amazing, right?
To sum up, children learn best when they are actively engaged in the process, and when the learning takes place in a fun and relaxed atmosphere. If your child finds math boring and difficult, find a way to make this subject more interesting for them. Educational games are always a good idea, but you can also try other brain-training activities like mental arithmetic.
At Active Brain Kids Academy, our Mental arithmetic program is designed to strengthen targeted cognitive skills – focus and concentration, memory, logic, and processing speed. Our brain-training mental exercises encourage active learning and help students build the foundation they need to successfully develop numerical fluency, learn math concepts, solve problems, and perform calculations.
Help your child become a real math wiz! Sign up for a free lesson and see the improvement for yourself.