Some people get anxious when they have to stand up and speak in public, some feel anxiety when they’re in crowded spaces and many feel anxious when they have to do math.
As an adult it’s easy to mask math anxiety by avoiding situations where you have to math, but like it or not math is a major part of school curricula worldwide and your child is likely to be doing some kind of math, if not daily, then at least several times a week and often in a class setting where their peers will be in a position to judge their math ability.
I’ve worked in math education for over 20 years and am a big advocate of kids doing a little bit of extra math each day or each week to boost their math ability and confidence. So it is interesting that researchers at Stanford University have recently published a paper demonstrating that math tutoring does indeed help students with math anxiety. The researcher took 2 groups of 3rd Graders (8 and 9 year olds) and gave one group one on one tutoring sessions for 8 weeks. After the 8 weeks, researchers found that both groups had improved their level of math skills but in addition “The children who started the study with high levels of math anxiety had reduced anxiety after tutoring” There was no change isn anxiety levels for those who started out with low anxiety levels.
So what can you as a parent of a math anxious child do to help?
1 – Get a tutor – for help finding a great tutor to work one on one with your child, read my posts: Need a Math Tutor – Read These 6 Tips and A Maths Tutor Reveals All
2 – Tutor your child yourself – the key feature of the tuition in the Stanford research was that when students encountered difficulties the tutors made sure to try to “get the child beyond the bottleneck in a non-negative, encouraging way.” Often as a parent, we want our kids to be better than us and don’t like it when they get things wrong. Being patient with your child when they can’t do the math will greatly reduce anxiety levels all round. Read more: The Key to Successfully Tutoring Your Own Children Maths
3 – Check their confidence level – Find out how your child sees their own math ability. Check out: How Confident is Your Child at Maths? Take the Quiz!
You can find the full article about how tutoring affects math anxiety on the Science Daily website.
