4Real Forums: math phobia

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Topic: math phobia

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LML22
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Joined: June 29 2006
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Posts: 33

Posted: Oct 12 2006 at 4:29pm \| IP Logged

my 7 year old dd is developing a math phobia. I don't want this; yet she struggles with math. She still counts on her fingers a bunch and doesn't have her basic facts down. We are doing seton this year so we are pretty much stuck with MCP until the year is over. I have MUS blocks and TM but no student edition and can't afford to buy something else. Any ideas on how to approach this? I have a teen dd who is my first and she developed a math phobia because I didn't know better than to push her to keep up. I don't want that to happen again.

mom3aut1not
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Joined: May 21 2005
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Posted: Oct 13 2006 at 2:30pm \| IP Logged

LML22,

I would separate learning math concepts and math facts. You can work on math facts over time -- don't stress out about it. Use games to learn math and back away from timed tests, grades, and so on. If you need to correct her, just do it and go on without fuss -- matter of factly.

As for concepts, look at www.livingmath.net for some ideas (and library books to share with her). Look for some of Marilyn Burns' books in the library or Family Math.

Mastering math facts is very different from learning math in general. It compares with learning to spell vs. reading literature. You can do it little by slowly while pursuing math concepts at whatever speed -- fast or slow-- the two of you are comfortable with.

In Christ,
Deborah
Math Lover

ALmom
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Joined: May 18 2005
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Posted: Oct 13 2006 at 9:27pm \| IP Logged

You can use MUS to teach concepts and your Seton text to work problems. The student book is basically practice problems to do with the blocks. If you let her do the MCP problems with the MUS blocks after showing the concept, shouldn't really matter. I do this a lot with all kinds of different texts. I think the most important thing is to do the correct amount of practice on each concept to be confident and secure without being bored. Also be sure to relate it to real life - so that whatever you are doing in the worktext carries over and is real!

Different children need differing levels of re-inforcement. If I remember correctly from our Seton days, you are not tied to the MCP worktext as much as to their tests so pick and chose from the worktext the quantity of reinforcement that works for your child and do it in whatever order you want either MCP order or MUS order and just give the test when you feel you have adequately covered those concepts. Do a lot of it with MUS blocks, with whatever games. Have fun. You can make any text work for you, believe me!

And you can seperate concepts from memory facts but for mine, they always enjoyed it more once the facts were down - and they could work faster that way and get to more interesting stuff. So we would take a break and do math baseball games for facts. Someone else found the opposite true for their child - just kept moving ahead and eventually they sped up and learned the facts but would have been bored to tears to slow down to their memory level. Also you can simply take longer or less time by skipping, chosing, supplementing, etc. If a concept is really solid in a child's head - skip the busy work in MCP (they have enough practice of the same concept in those books to drive anyone to tears, imo)and find a few real life applications for the concept, take the test and move on. Look at what concepts MCP is teaching and which MUS is teaching and you can make it work for you. Doing Seton, you just have to keep their tests in mind - or whatever is Seton graded - the rest is totally up to you. You really can make it work.

Janet

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