Good news for teachers, parents, and students… Lots of kids who hate math might get some vindication by a new study that suggests that forcing kids to sit down and do boring math problems might not be as helpful as showing them how math can be relevant to their lives. (Or, in the words of students all over, “make it fun.”) However, these kids also worked hard to improve their learning strategies.
The study finds that children who had higher levels of motivation and who used effective cognitive strategies improved their math achievement scores over five years, starting in fifth grade. Interestingly, they had higher levels of improvement than kids who started off the study with better IQ scores.
As a teacher, I always felt that math was one of those things in which repetitive practice, especially in the earlier grades, paid off. I remember drilling myself in third grade for hours on multiplication facts. When I taught middle school, I was always astounded that there were kids in middle school who hadn’t memorized their times tables. I wondered why someone wasn’t forcing them to sit down right now and memorize and practice.
I think what this study is saying is that it’s not enough just to force kids to sit down and learn facts. The most learning comes from when kids are taught strategies of how to learn and how these things matter in their own lives.
Interesting study and thoughts.From a mom who has a high IQ and to whom learning always came very easy, I’ve struggled with why it is not just ‘simple’ for my kids. I’ve really had to stop myself from making them sit for hours with flashcards and multiplication tables until they “got it” – that seems (to me, at least) to be the easiest and most direct way to ‘get it’. But, it doesn’t work (just ask my oldest). I also believe, like the study, that teaching how to learn, is key. I took a class in 4th or 5th grade on how to study…and I really believe that is why things came so easy for me. I still remember the tips and tricks from that class all these years later.
Thanks for linking up with the GtKY hop!
Yes, teaching study skills and other cognitive and “noncognitive” habits — like checking over your work, budgeting your time, persisting a task until you find the right answer — are so important and so hard to teach in a relevant way to kids. It’s so difficult to figure out as a teacher and as a parent to make kids understand and to apply those skills meaningfully. I taught a study skills class to seventh graders many years ago, and it was a disastrous. Those skills that I tried to teach them were so out of context from their regular classes and regular lives and worries. In some ways, I think parents are probably the best ones to emphasize how important those skills are to their future academic lives and opportunities.