10 Ways to Help a Child with Dyscalculia at Home
If your child has just been diagnosed with dyscalculia, you probably have a lot of emotions floating around. When I speak to parents whose child has just been diagnosed, there are two main topics that come up – will they be able to go to university/have the career they want and what can I do to help.
In this article, I’ll share 10 practical ways you can support your child at home:
- Build confidence first
- Don’t panic if they forget
- Use manipulatives
- Play games
- Practise little and often
- Focus on understanding, not speed
- Don’t rely on worksheets
- Encourage questions
- Celebrate progress
Build Confidence First
The most important thing that you can do with your child is to build their confidence
Your child most likely has very little maths confidence. In fact, they probably dread maths and already know that they are not very good at maths in comparison to their friends. For your child, building confidence first is vital. If they feel that they can do something and get it right, then they are going to learn more and be more willing to try. For your child, remembering their ‘Friends of Ten’ is really hard, even though to you it seems easy. To help them build confidence, I have my 5 minute confidence activities, which have no worksheets in sight. Another way to build confidence is to practise maths that they can do. When I meet a new student, I always start with something that I know they can do – it could be saying which number comes after another number, it could be counting up in tens. By choosing something that your child can do, it reminds them that they can do some maths and just this one small thing goes a long way to build confidence.
Building confidence is so important that I recently wrote an article about how confidence develops through practice and perseverance when learning something new.
Don't panic if they forget
One of the most common concerns I hear from parents is that their child seems to forget maths that they have already learned. Unfortunately, students with dyscalculia do often forget – it is part of having dyscalculia.
However, once parents realise that forgetting is part of dyscalculia and not a sign of their child not trying, it becomes a little easier to cope with.
If your child forgets something – this can happen even after 5 minutes during some practise and very frequently if there is a gap – it’s almost like your child has never done it before – the most important thing is to normalise this and not make a big deal out of it.
For my students, we talk about how frustrating it can be and that it is part of having dyscalculia and work on accepting that this is how their brain works.
Learning is rarely a straight line. In another article, I shared how a crack that appeared in a pottery project reminded me that setbacks are a normal part of learning and don’t mean that progress has been lost.
Use manipulatives
Alongside frequently forgetting, for students with dyscalculia, one of the main areas of difficulty is number sense – that is knowing how numbers are related to each other and the size of different numbers. Equipment allows your child to see and physically explore mathematical ideas rather than trying to hold everything in their head.
One of the best ways to help your child is to use equipment. Now, there is some equipment that is specific for maths such as cuisenaire rods and rekenreks but other equipment you will have in your house, such as lego, coins, counters and measuring cups. Lego is a great resource for maths and is really versatile for demonstrating different maths concepts.
Another thing that you have probably noticed is that your child is exceptionally creative and very visual. By using equipment, this also helps them to remember different concepts as they are much more likely to remember images and using equipment than abstract written calculations and methods.
Play games
As mentioned, your child is going to need a lot of repetition of basic number facts. To do this, the best way is to play games. There are lots of really fun games that can help with this.
- Shut the Box is a firm favourite with my students – it helps your child practise adding numbers up to 12 and find different ways of making the total.
- Another favourite is Skyjo, where you need to try and get the lowest score to win. Top Trump cards are also very popular and they heelp your child order numbers.
- There are also many different card games that can be played to practising simple addition and multiplication.
Another thing that you have probably noticed is that your child is exceptionally creative and very visual. By using equipment, this also helps them to remember different concepts as they are much more likely to remember images and using equipment than abstract written calculations and methods.
Practise little and often
As students with dyscalculia forget a lot of the maths they are taught, it is really important to practise regularly. A couple of minutes each day will help them to start remembering and also will feel manageable. Doing 45 minutes of practise once a week will be painful for both your and your child! If you can’t manage one day, don’t worry, just try the next day (but not for longer). Honestly, short and sweet is always best – unless your child wants to continue because you are playing a game and they are having fun!
Focus on understanding, not speed
Students with dyscalculia often process maths information more slowly. This means that it takes them longer to answer a question. It doesn’t mean that they are not learning. Being able to answer maths questions, such as mental addition or multiplication quickly, in your head, is not a sign of understanding maths but rather demonstrates that you can recall information quickly. More importantly, by focusing on understanding a maths concept rather than being able to give the correct answer, means that your child is able to show what they understand. When I am working with students who have dyscalculia, I take the focus away from the getting the answer correct and emphasis what we know and how to work it out. For example, knowing that 3 x 5 means three groups of five, is far more important than knowing the answer of 15.
Don't rely on worksheets
Worksheets can bring on a complete feeling of dread. Imagine this: you are learning a new language (for example Mandarin) and you are given a long worksheet full of all the characters that you are supposed to know and remember. How would you feel? For me, I would look at it and think, I’ll never be able to do all of this and shut down. This is very likely to happen to your child. Instead, I recommend using dice to create questions and numbers or, if I am using a worksheet, cut up each question and put then in a container and pull them out one by one. This means that you can stop whenever you want.
Use everyday maths
There are lots of every day activities that involve maths that you can do with your child. For example, baking. In baking, you can show your child how to weigh out ingredients, measure liquids on a scale, set the temperature of the oven, etc. If your child enjoys playing sport, you can wokr with them to understand the score lines, etc. If your child enjoys making things, you can use tape measures to measure out things, etc
Encourage questions
Many times, students with dyscalculia are reluctant to ask questions, especially as they get older as they realise that their peers understand a lot more of the maths than they do, and, to save face, they don’t want to look stupid. Because of this, they stay quiet and find ways to get around not being able to understand.
I was recently reminded of the importance of asking questions when a simple conversation about a bag of ruby clay completely changed my understanding of how to use it.
It is really important that your child is able to ask questions about their maths and also about dyscalculia. By normalising any question they ask, making them feel like the question is a good question will really help them to feel ilke they can ask for help. I had a 13 year old ask me what halving was. I was really happy that she asked as it showed me that she trusted me enough to ask the question when she knew that she should already understand the concept.
Celebrate progress
Celebrating progress is so important because this helps your child gain confidence and, in turn, motivation. For your child, progress will often be something really small. For example, they have remembered that 4 + 6 make ten. They counted up and down in twos accurately. All of these are really important foundational skills and facts and they are hard for your child to remember. Furthermore, your child will most likely be concentrating on what they can’t do and it is very easy for everyone to forget how far they have come. With my students, I often remind them what they couldn’t do when I first met them and compare it to what they can do now – they are often amazed by all the things and how much easier these things feel. We talk about what has happened so that they can do them and what we can learn from them. This helps them to realise that they need to work hard and practise and that sometimes they will make mistakes but that this is okay and all part of learning. We also talk about how when they have had a break, they may forget more but this is also okay and that they need a little reminder to help them.
Children with dyscalculia can learn maths, develop confidence and achieve their goals. The journey they take may look different to most children at school and may take longer. However, with the right support, encouragement and opportunities, your child can make progress. Did you know that there are some people with dyscalculia who have gone on to be mathematicians? And, for these people, if you asked them to work out a times table question, they still wouldn’t be able to but have a very successful career.
Having dyscalculia does not stop someone from achieving their goals. There are successful business owners, artists, musicians, entrepreneurs and scientists with dyscalculia. Many have found ways to work with their strengths and develop strategies for areas they find difficult.
The most important thing you can do is to remember that your child’s diagnosis doesn’t define what they can achieve.