Category: Kids Math Help

With math phobia assuming alarming proportions amongst school-goers of every age, it is imperative that the elementary math curriculum be revamped to ensure that the kids get well grounded in math matters. The dire need of the hour is to devise a mode of teaching that will instill a sense of wonder regarding math in the minds of the kids, so that they develop a desire to learn the intricacies of the subject and feel an urge to tackle math problems and lessons.

The Ideal Way Of Imparting Elementary Math Instructions

These days it has been widely acknowledged that the best way to go about teaching elementary level math is to introduce fun, frolic and dynamism into the lessons so that the kids feel no reason to shy away from the subject. And while you do all these, keep in mind that you need to start off only with the very basic math concepts before introducing tougher topics.

There are various fun-filled activities that you can have the kids indulge in to learn the ropes of math. For instance, if you want your kid to learn the numbers the easy way out, then it would be worthwhile to use playing cards or number cards for the purpose. You can also introduce games into the lessons like posting numbers all throughout the house and have him hunt around for a particular digit. You can be rest assured that your child is going to love this deadly combo of math and hide-and-seek!

Again, if you want your child to perfect his counting skills, then have him count the things out of your shopping cart or the number of fruits that are laid on the dinner table.

These are ways and means that are a zillion times better than thrusting the numbers book under his nose and prodding him to go on a memorizing spree. Learnt through fun, these elementary math lessons will stand him in good stead when he advances on to the more tricky aspects of the subject.

Only progress to the next level after you become absolutely sure that your kid has got the hang of the fundamentals of the subject. Herein also you can make use of activities and games to help your child develop an interest in math. You can use flash cards to teach him the basics of addition and subtraction and better still, use objects to demonstrate the subtle differences between the various mathematical operations.

Speaking of the more complex mathematical concerns like geometry, algebra and fractions, you should devise your math practice worksheet with a proper understanding of your kid’s prevailing level of knowledge and understanding of the respective mathematical concepts. Remember your goal is not to scare or discourage him with math problems that any average adult would tear his hair to solve.

Thus for example, when you need to teach geometry as part of an elementary math curriculum, it’s a good idea to have him draw the various shapes and figures with his own hand and then make attempts to differentiate between the 2-D and the 3-D shapes. This basic knowledge would in turn help them gather understanding on aspects like spatial relationships, maps and using geometric modeling to solve problems.

If you put on your thinking cap, there’s simply no dearth of innovative, intelligent and interesting ways to go about teaching elementary math. All that you need to do is step into the shoes of your child and look out into the world the way he does. You will find oodles of inspiration to fuse fun with elementary math.

Help your child learn math the easy way so that he doesn’t come to consider the subject as something that is intolerable and thus needs to be steered clear off. Furthermore, once the kids discover the inherent fun and wonder in maths, it will be all the more easy for them to progress on to the intricacies of advanced maths.

How To Learn The Basic Math Concepts

In order that kids learn to appreciate the nitty-grittys of math, it is essential that you teach them the subject in the context of “real-world” situations, so that they get the idea that maths has some use outside text books too. Furthermore, it has been scientifically proved that kids learn math best when they are required to use the concepts of maths to solve real-world problems.

For instance, you can teach your child all about counting with exercises like asking him to fetch “three” cups from the drawer or pick up “eight” peaches from the fruit bowl. This is far better than having him teach basic counting concepts from a book. Again, you can look to board games, preferably the ones with “backward” moves, to help your child learn the ins and outs of sequential mathematical operations.

Speaking of mathematical operations, you can also devise such innovative and engaging ways and means to guide your child when he is about to learn addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

A merry round of games that will not only make for fun and frolic, but will also give the kids some intensive maths lessons.

There are also better alternatives than the textbook to help your child learn the tricky aspects of maths like decimals and fractions. For instance, you can take real life objects, say a cake or a chit of paper, divide them into halves and quarters and use these pieces to get across your instructions regarding decimals and fractions. Similarly, you can have your child to draw or model shapes to get a hang of geometry. In fact, handling the shapes will also teach him to distinguish between 2D and 3D objects.

There is a host of maths games on the Internet for you to download and let your child play them. These games are fun, interactive and educational and give your kids a good grounding in even the complex facets of algebra, coordinate geometry and the like.

When your child needs to learn math, it is imperative that he gets a proper guidance so that he can develop a love for the subject.

Kindergarten math curriculum should essentially incorporate activities and practical experiences that nurture the child’s logical sense rather than mere rote knowledge. Actually, teaching math to kindergarten attending kids means giving them a comprehensive understanding of basic concepts of math so that the children develop a positive attitude towards mathematics from the very early stages of life.

Children learn best while at play; hence, math curriculum for kids should essentially be fun. Involve the children in play and day-to-day activities instead of having them work with math worksheets and the like only.

Kindergarten math is as much about vocabulary as about numerals. Start with counting and help the children recognize numbers and understand what the numbers actually mean. Thus, have the kids count themselves in the class, count body parts or chairs and desks in the classroom, etc. Such activities will give them good practice in counting.

As the kids grow familiar with the numerals and their meaning (that zero means ‘nothing’, 2 means collection of two objects, etc.), plan some worksheet-based activities like writing down numerals up to 20. While teaching two-digit numbers, you can also introduce the children to the elementary math concepts like ‘face value’ and ‘place value’.

Geometry lessons will revolve round teaching shapes to the kids. Draw out different shapes on the board and have the children match each with its corresponding shape. You can make use of pattern blocks. Have children hunt for shapes in magazines and paste them in their worksheets. You can come up with numerous other activities as a teacher.

Measurement activities such as the number of steps one needs to reach a mark, drawing a line of a certain length with the help of the ruler and other such linear measurements form excellent activities for kindergarten kids. Comparisons of length, weight or thickness also give practical experience as part of kindergarten math curriculum.

Concepts of time and money also need to be incorporated in the kindergarten math program. Thus, introduce your students to such concepts as morning, afternoon, day, noon and night and let the children identify coins and have some conception of their values.

Follow it up by planning lessons on grouping and comparison. Have the kindergarteners sort and classify objects according to shapes, sizes or colors. Introduce the children to comparison terms like ‘less than’, ‘more than’, taller, shorter, bigger, etc. With the children showing better comprehension in these, you can broaden your kindergarten math curriculum and have enhanced data analysis methods like the representation of information included in it.

Use of manipulative materials like building blocks, color cubes, geoblocks, polydrons, etc. can also make the math learning process more interesting. Games such as Dominoes, Electronic Numbers, Counting Toys, printable Shape-softwares, and similar recent inventions, used judiciously, can help you plan unparalleled activities for teaching kindergarten math to kids.

Teaching Kindergarten Math is indeed a challenge every inch but if a teacher successfully implants the math basics into the budding minds, the children grow up to become sensible individuals solving math problems and dealing with life situations with equal ease.

Children are not the only ones into Math activities, even grown-ups are fond of these activities though they are mature in nature. In fact most of the simple games played on computer follow the basic principles of the maths activity. These games are stimulating for the mind and also encourage us to think, and are therefore perfect for the mental growth and development of the tiny tots.

However, teaching math activities to your kids does not necessarily mean that you have to send them to any school. You could include these elementary games into your daily task and encourage your children to perform them. You have to make sure of one thing though that the children never realize they are chores!

One such activity amongst these games is taking objects of different shapes and hiding it in different places all over the house, but you have to know many there are. So that when your child finds them he/she can count them and collect them. This teaching method is very effective because children never consider it to be anything else than a game and unconsciously also learn in the process. These games being of interactive in nature helps in the child’s communicating ability.

There are many numeral activities and math games that children respond to; one such game, which you could devise, is to cut out big pieces of paper with large numbers written on it. You could then scatter the papers all round the room and make the children line up at the edge of the room. Now you could ask them a simple question like, “How many fingers do you have in one hand?” and the children have to go and sit down on the right numeral. The kid who is able to identify the right number first gets one point. You could continue the game with different questions.

Make small books for your child by sticking together 10 or 20 pieces of blank paper, make it attractive by covering it up with colored paper and give it a colorful name as well. Now ask your child to write down every thing that he / she has seen throughout the day with numerals for example, how many birds has he / she seen during that day. Let him/her take two adjacent pages and write the numeral on one page and draw the object, in this case the birds on the opposite page. In this way your child will learn on his/her own.

Math activities can be varied and can have different styles and completely depends on your imagination. The more you can invent and diversify the math activities the better it will be for your child.

Ours is a modern scientific age where math for kids is extremely necessary as kids go about experiencing and learning things around them. Math is everywhere and is the most practically applicable subject and thus it is vital that kids learn it at school as well as at home.

There are many activities, which can help your kid in learning basic maths concepts. These activities are interactive in nature and are used in the kindergarten and primary sections and are drawn from everyday situations. The materials used are readily available and the game based activities can be done anywhere and are fun.

You have to be extremely patient with kids learning basic math. As maths involves a lot of hard work, make the learning process fun with interesting activities. At the end of learning basic math concepts reward the kid with a game or puzzles. This kind of appreciative display in your part give kids confidence and learning math becomes fun as well as useful. Lot of online activities and games are available on the Internet. Also puzzles like Sudoku, which is a popular game incorporate math.

Math taught in schools treat different concepts in parts. Thus children do not develop a comprehensive idea of math based on reasoning. Lack of comprehension in basic concepts poses difficulties in advanced level of math learning. This can be rectified with help of math courses, which are structured stage by stage in a logical manner.

There are many software math programs for all levels of learning that build a solid math foundation. The activities are done in a pleasing interactive atmosphere. Questions are posed which confirm how much the kid has learned. Previous testing enables you to know their specific needs and weaknesses. Software programs for math for kids enable both understanding and memory of concepts.

In math for kids programs the process of learning and application are more important than arriving at the right answers. When kids make mistakes, it helps you to identify what he did not grasp. Mistakes are therefore good guides to math learning. Ask your child how he arrived at the answers. While he describes the process you can understand in which areas he needs help. Encourage your child to do difficult math problems. This way kids develop a power of logical thinking which strengthens their math base.

Mental maths is very important. Nowadays people calculate in their minds or use a calculator and computer rather than working out with paper and pencil. In this technological age kids are taught to use calculators during tests and homework. On the computer they learn through worksheets, graphs, spreadsheets and drawings.

There are sets of milestones to be achieved by kids while learning math. For e.g. a preschooler should be able to count the number of things in a given set, understand number value, sort objects by size and shape and do simple addition and subtraction using physical objects. Children in early primary years should be able to add and subtract with ease using correct signs. They should start grasping the fundamentals of multiplication and measure time and money.

At the next level, learning of multiplication tables, fractions, decimals, percentages and handling math problems are imperative. At a later stage kids should understand abstract symbols and relations. Math for kids at this stage should include equations and formulae and using computers with ease.

Yes, math, kids and everyday life are essentially linked with each other. Our daily lives are woven round the many concepts of maths and if, as a kid, one fails to understand mathematical logic (and their connections with our daily lives) one is bound to fail miserably. It is of utmost importance, therefore, that while teaching math, kids be allowed to explore and discover the world of math around them.

Studies of human and animal nature have proved that the learning process becomes easier if one is having fun, enjoying the things one is doing. It is truer of kids and so math lessons for kids need essentially be planned around fun everyday activities and games. This way kids will pick up the basics of maths easily, acquiring a comprehensive understanding of mathematical logic. Later in life, this will help them approach advanced math problems like algebra, fractions, geometry, percentage, even puzzles and statistics, et al in a positive frame of mind.

To get started with pre-school kids, you can come up with some fun-filled activities (as also games) introducing elementary math concepts. Help your child make numerals with his / her play dough. Write down numbers between 0 and 9 and have the kid color it or decorate it. Have your child read out the numbers in calendars, hoardings, letterboxes, nameplates, etc.

You can also arrange group games for kids to help identify and memorize numbers. Hand a small card with a number inscribed on it to each kid and place a large number card on the floor. Ask the kid with the matching card number to come and sit on the large card. Continue until each one in the group has found a match for his / her number. Parents can also try out hide-and-seek games hiding number cards throughout the house and asking the kids to find them.

When it comes to perfecting your child’s counting skills, you can again go for some practical activities and games. Have the child count the number of snacks and candies given to him / her. Counting body parts will prove doubly helpful – the child will get to learn the names of body-parts and have a good counting practice. Games like dominoes also give counting practice.

For a group counting math activity, stick colored number-stencils on a board (any numbers, say 1 to 10) and have some color buttons in a bowl. Ask the kids, one by one, to glue match the number of buttons against each digit pasted on the board. This group activity can become a solo activity with a copy and colored stickers to replace the board and the buttons.

There are numerous games and logical thinking activities, measurement activities, shape activities, etc., which can further hone your child’s math skills. Thus, have your child measure a table with his / her tiny little hand or have the distance between two points be measured in the number of steps the child needs to take instead of getting started with scales and measuring tapes.

You can have varied shape cakes and breads baked to get your child interested in geometry. Draw out shapes and have the kids outline them with colored threads and laces. Evoke logical thinking in your kid by getting the child involved in grouping/ classification activities. Games based on comparison (between groups, sets, etc.) also aid sharpen math skills.

Fun activities and games can indeed make the process of learning math easy and effective. They lay the basis for a strong foundation in math. Kids, side-by-side, benefit from the practical application of math in life – getting their initial trainings in listening to and following instructions, developing planning skills. This is the math, kids and even adults love.