Lesson 5: Reading, Writing and 'Rithmetic
Tips for Mastering Math
Math can be very frustrating for parents of special needs children. Some children have dyscalcula, a learning disability similar to dyslexia that affects math skills. Other children do not write well, cannot organize, have difficulty memorizing or can’t stay focused.
Research your math program carefully to be sure it suits your child’s needs. You may have to adapt or supplement, since many children with learning disabilities need far more repetitious practice than do other children. Those who cannot write will need to dictate, type or find other methods for recording work.
Memorization is a particularly frustrating aspect of math for many children. Your child may need years to memorize basic facts, but you needn’t stay with basic addition until he completes the memorization process. Simply add a memorization activity to each math lesson. Let your child help you create interesting ways to memorize math facts. We played a variation on the card game of War to help my daughter memorize multiplication problems. She and I put down a card and she multiplied to find the answer. If she was correct, she got both cards.
It often works best to memorize in small doses. I chose two math facts to have my children memorize. I made a worksheet with nothing but these two facts in various patterns. For example, the first row might have: 9x3, 2x8, 2x8, 2x8, 9x3. Throughout the day, I also called out those two problems, and the children would call back the answer. We used many of the techniques we used to teach sight words. When the child mastered those two facts, I added a third. This takes a long time, but the problems do get memorized.
Writing the work is a special challenge for many children with physical or learning disabilities. A spastic child may have difficulty writing neatly and a child with dysgraphia may not be able to write for any length of time.
In the early stages of math, a child with writing disorders should be taught to do mental math. The more he can do in his head, the less important his writing disorder will be. We let our children add totals at the grocery store, multiply and divide fractions during cooking and perform other practical mental math tasks. Naturally, this is not effective for children who also have memory or some concentration disorders.
Math work can be adapted. I cut out numerous paper digits that my children could glue on to show the answers. They could use plastic or cardboard numbers to do longer math problems instead of writing them out. When I had time, they dictated problems to me or recorded answers on a tape recorder. I also used workbooks instead of math books so they would not have to copy the problems.
Some children have difficulty lining up the numbers in a problem. Use graph paper to resolve this issue. The children place each digit into a square and this allows them to line the problems up. Some children also do well using lined notebook paper turned sideways.
The secret to teaching math to a child is to break each new skill into the smallest possible step. In most cases, you must do a fair amount of hands-on work as well. Take a look at these introductory math lessons for preschoolers. I have broken each step down into very small sections of learning, because I was teaching them to gifted preschoolers. However, I also used no writing at all, since my children have dysgraphia, which is a writing disorder. While some of these activities are too young for older students, they can be adapted to older children who cannot write by using more sophisticated objects and words.
The next secret is to review. You will be amazed at how much review is really needed. Many children with learning disabilities have a difficult time getting information into their long term memory. Each day, I began by offering a math problem the children had already been taught. If they could do it, I moved on—-but doing it was a form of review. If they could not, I re-taught it and did not try to introduce a new subject. I checked on that type of problem every day for a week or so. If they could do it each time, I began checking it only once a week, then once a month and then occasionally. You will cover less material than a public school child in many cases, but what is learned is learned perfectly, unlike the children who use a standard curriculum.
As with reading, teach the material in as many different ways as possible. When my children were older, they always gathered three or four different math books for the subjects they were teaching themselves. If one book’s explanation didn’t work, they checked another one. Usually, the combination of books made the material clear. This allowed them to learn math that was beyond their mother.
Teach using your child’s strengths. I failed algebra many times before nervously taking a class at the local community college prior to homeschooling. The teacher realized my strength was language and that I viewed math as some weird foreign language. She had me label each part of a math problem with grammar tags--verb, noun and so on. Then she taught me to use synonyms. When I saw a percentage sign I was trained to think, “Multiply.” Throughout school I had gotten into my mind that percentages involved division, because they were a part of the whole. This revolutionized my understanding! It was a simple case of teaching using words, which I understood, to make the numbers clearer.
Some children will never understand the concepts. In several cases, I was nearly in tears because I did not and could not understand the concepts I was being taught in algebra. My instructor told me to stop caring why and just do it. I wasn’t going to be a mathematician anyway, so what difference did it really make that I didn’t understand?
The use of calculators is controversial. I discovered, when I went to college, that I was required to use a calculator. My philosophy for homeschooling, then became this: Learn to do the problem by hand just so that you can. Then master it on the calculator. The calculator is a time saver for children with physical and learning disabilities. Continue to review the problem without the calculator on a regular basis just to be sure the child remembers how it is done.
