Maths is a subject that a lot of children find difficult at school. It can require time and practice to build skills and traditional rote learning can make studying maths feel like a chore. Extra tutoring can help to engage your child as there’s more time to make learning maths fun! This boost in confidence and knowledge will help them participate in learning key concepts and gain all-round skills to use throughout their education.
Why is maths difficult to learn?
There are many factors that influence how well your child picks-up maths when they are at school. Some of the common reasons maths can be a struggle to learn include:
Difficulty visualising problems that are not seen as relevant in real life situations
Pressure to ‘get the right answer’ which can affect confidence and engagement
Traditional instructional teaching methods that may not include enough exploration and understanding and can disengage children
Maths concepts often build up on one another so missing foundation skills can make advanced topics difficult to grasp
Progress can be hampered without time to practice
Engaging children to learn maths concepts
The key to making learning maths fun is engagement so that a child feels motivated, empowered and confident in their abilities. It’s also about positive reinforcement, practice and making concepts relatable.
Some of the ways we do this at MagiKats include:
Interactive and hands-on activities. We use physical objects, games and puzzles that get young minds working in a way that helps them to understand maths concepts.
Small group learning. Students work through problems in small groups suitable for their age and ability with a mentor that helps to inspire participation with plenty of positive encouragement and rewards.
Practical examples. These make maths questions relatable and provide support to help develop core skills that they can use throughout school.
Encouraging a positive mindset. We praise effort, persistence and improvement rather than just correct answers. This positivity helps children to see that mistakes are a part of learning and boosts confidence in their ability to tackle new maths challenges.
Worksheets to take home. Our students have short worksheets to complete at home to reinforce what they’ve learnt at MagiKats.
Maths skills for teenagers
As children get older and the prospect of exams looms on the horizon, maths lessons can become even more difficult for struggling learners. Closely linked to the National Curriculum, MagiKats workshops cater for teenagers heading towards their GCSEs or National 5 exams with specifically tailored programmes of maths tuition support. Developing teenagers’ maths skills in the latter years of school will provide a valuable confidence boost and the extra practice they’ll need to empower them to achieve their full potential come exam time.
How can you help at home?
The good news is you don’t have to be a maths whizz to help your child understand that learning maths can be fun! Try these simple ways to help them to see that maths isn’t just a school subject, it’s useful outside of the classroom too.
Get them to think about numbers. Use statistics in sport or find interesting facts about shape, size and quantity. Make it a game to guess and then check answers online. Remember to ask why they’ve come to that answer and reward effort.
Use their favourite games to ask questions. For example, how many points do they need to reach the next level?
Look for maths on the TV or online and talk about it together. For example, a percentage off special offer, probability in weather reports or the finishing times of different lengths of TV shows.
Use cooking as a real life example for fractions and proportions.
When out and about ask them to think about the distances travelled or the amount of time it will take to get somewhere. Or, for younger children, count how many trees or animals they can see on a journey.
You don’t have to go it alone
If your child needs extra support in maths, MagiKats is here to help. They’ll get plenty of fun learning experiences and support to reach their full potential. Get in touch with your local centre to discuss enrolling in our tuition workshops.
