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Unleash a Love of Learning in Your Child!

TIP #2: Making Math Make “Cents”!

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In the last installment, I referred to the “right brained” thinker. You may be asking, what is the difference between a left-brained and a right brained thinker? Those with “right-brained” qualities are usually highly creative and artistic, with little patience for detailed steps. They can tend to have a harder time staying focused and have an inclination towards the arts, drama, and music. Left-brained people tend to be more sequential in their thinking, and gravitate toward technical and analytical thinking. Their aptitude usually lies in the sciences and math. This, of course, can become a problem when the right-brained child is forced to learn concepts of math that do not come easily for him!

Math is an abstract concept that can be made more understandable when illustrated with visuals and manipulatives. What are manipulatives? They are hands-on objects that show, not only visually, but in a three-dimensional space, the method of solving a problem. Many manipulatives are available for the subject of mathematics. When studying number placement (ones, tens, hundreds, thousands, etc.), base-10 blocks are commonly used. Children can see how a one-unit is one-tenth of a 10-unit, and a 10-unit is one-tenth of a hundred-unit, and so on. By placing the units on a chart and regrouping by adding or taking away, the idea of addition and subtraction is illustrated, helping the child’s brain to visualize the concept and better understand it. Basic addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division can be taught by using objects as counters. If you use edible counters, such as grapes or small candies, you’ve just added in the element of “snack time”!

When studying fractions, there are a variety of fractional materials available in the form of circles, bars, and more. Children can see visually how fractions relate to each other, as well as equivalencies between fractions with different denominators. Try breaking a graham cracker or chocolate bar to represent fractions. I can guarantee you, if you gave a child a candy bar and asked her if she’d rather share it with one other friend and keep half or share it with eleven other children and keep one-twelfth, she will remember more keenly that the larger the denominator, the smaller the fraction… or in this case, the piece of chocolate!

Money is always best taught by using actual or play money. I’ve found that when children are put in a “store” scenario, certain concepts begin to become second nature. Have them create price tags for a variety of items such as pencils, rulers, hats, books, toys, and anything they can find. Start younger children with items priced between $.01-.10 and increase the costs as per the child’s level. Addition of items and subtraction for change will be practiced over and over as the children take turns shopping and cashing out each other. Introduce multiplication with groups of items, such as a box of 12 pencils at $.05 each, or a dozen eggs at $.03 each.

What child doesn’t like a lesson that includes food! When studying weights and measures, have him bake or cook something. Don’t waste all that good measuring time—let it result in a nice dessert or snack! Try to vary forms of measurement, using utensils and a kitchen scale, and both solid and liquid measuring tools. This is a great time to sneak in fractions. You can purposely use a measuring cup that is not an exact match to challenge him to approximate equivalent measurements.

These are just a few ideas to keep math both hands-on and above all, understandable to a visual child. Most people are visual and need problems “shown” to them to really make cents… oops, I mean “sense.”