Dealing With Speed
Sometimes math anxiety has a lot to do with speed. In school, speed is often important, but at home, it is not. This is one real benefit parents have, that teachers don't - letting children work through things at their own pace, finding their way, even if it's round-about at first. I have seen students visibly relax just on hearing the words, 'take as much time as you need.' Parents often feel that they need to hurry children along to an answer, when actually they can help more by giving a child a sense that he can stretch into the problem. One of the biggest problem our country's children face is a lack of stamina to really delve into their problems. If your child is taking time, don't feel that it's taking too long, but rather praise him for getting in and staying in, even when it's tough. We cannot overestimate how valuable this will be to him throughout his math learning, and something he is not likely to learn in school.
"But won't this keep him slow?" parents often ask me, worried that if their child doesn't learn to rush, he'll get left behind.
Not at all. It is much easier to speed up once we've learned it "right", than it is to slow down and learn it over. Just as a music student who gets faster playing a piece once she's learned it well, math students get naturally faster at problems and procedures, after they've stretched into it and really learned it. But the students who often have the biggest struggle learning as the math gets harder, are the ones to whom it came quickly. Not only do they not know how to slow down, they don't think they're supposed to. They think deep thinking indicates a problem, when in fact, it's the best way to learn math.
Let your children slow down at home. This will greatly reduce their math anxiety. It won't keep them slow, but it very well might help them feel more comfortable.
For more ideas and stories from real students, listen to Suzanne's audiocassette series, "How to Help..."
