Mathematics

MATHEMATICS IN THE HOME ENVIRONMENT

The connection between family and school plays an important part in a child’s education. Families have a crucial role in developing a child’s understanding and application of Mathematics.

The Mathematics Association of Victoria has developed a list of their ‘Top 5 Tips’ for parents, wanting to support their child’s learning in Mathematics.

Learning Maths Is About Strategies

Much of the actual maths is the same as what you may have learnt. Although learning maths is becoming more about understanding the reasoning and using a variety of different strategies to do maths. Teachers value students using many strategies to solve problems and develop thinking.

Ask Questions

You don’t have to know the answers! Nor do you have to know how to get there. Just ask questions and let your child think it through. Here are some of our favourites: What thinking did you use to get this far?

What else could you try, is there another way?

What could the next step be?

Be Persistent, Learn Together

Maths can be challenging. Rather than saying ‘I can’t do that’, or ‘It’s too hard’, say ‘I can’t do that yet,’ or ‘We will work it out together’. Research shows parental support is a major factor in student success at school. Celebrate achieving small steps in solving a problem. Persist, be supportive and remember to focus on the thinking, not getting answers.

See Maths Everyday

There is plenty of maths around you to develop numeracy skills, such as calculating, measuring, using numbers, interpreting data and graphs, recognising patterns, and using language to develop mathematical understanding. Ask questions about the maths in activities like cooking, exercise, sports, budgeting and shopping. Playing games is also a fun way to practice and experience maths.

Stay Positive, Keep Calm

Let your children experience maths positively. Refrain from saying ‘I was never good at maths’ or ‘I never liked maths’. Maths can, and should be, really fun!

PROBLEM OF THE WEEK

English

Welcome back to the start of a new school year. At this time parents often ask what they can do to help their child in their reading journey.

You make a difference to your children’s reading journey. Your role as an advocate for your children’s reading success cannot be overestimated. It has a direct impact on the ease and confidence with which they pursue their reading and writing.

It is the joy and love of sharing a good book on a nightly basis that sets the foundation for their reading success, and ensures that reading is given the priority it deserves. Reading regularly with someone who cares is the inspiration that all readers deserve.

As parents and carers, you create the home context for reading and set the tone for how reading is valued. Fear, anxiety, stress and humiliation have no place in the reading experience. The ‘payoff’ for reading together has to be worth coming back to night after night after night. When reading together is the best time of your children’s day and the best time of your day, it is worth turning up. The right book infused with fun, laughter, and love goes a long way in creating life-long readers who in thirty years’ time recall with joy being snuggled on the lounge with you and their favourite book.

Reading begins at a very early age when children start to take notice of the print that surrounds them and the talk that includes them. Children begin to engage with reading and writing experiences that attract their attention and interest before they go to school. Children notice street signs and most can recognise a large yellow ‘M’ sign from a kilometre up the road because it benefits them! They pay attention to books they like and often insist on many re-readings of their favourites. They learn quickly to find apps on mobile phones and electronic devices because it benefits them to do so.

Talk is a key to literacy learning. Children need opportunities to interact. Recent research indicates that children are becoming more adept at communicating in the language of commands and demands rather than being competent in extended conversations.

Children need to be included in interactions with significant others and to ensure that happens, electronic devices need to be turned off. It is in the context of engaged conversations that children expand their vocabularies, increase their understanding of the world, learn about themselves, and learn the nuances of the language and effective communication.

Let children make decisions about the books they choose to read. This implies that there is a well-stocked and suitable range of books from which to choose. It is essential that there are lots of books in the home and that they are readily available. Create a book-flood by borrowing weekly from the local library, buying from garage sales, finding supermarket specials, making your own, and sharing books in the community.

To accommodate the diversity of home literacy practices, it is essential that parents:

engage children in many and varied types of literacy experiences not just storybook reading, for example, cooking, newspapers, television information, instructions, street signs, brochures, junk mail, electronic communication, notes, singing, talk, and written communication
appreciate that different family members, not just parents, play a role in literacy learning, for example grandparents, siblings, extended families
recognise and celebrate the literacy associated with cultural differences and traditions
locate resources, for example, interpreters and electronic resources that can assist in decreasing the communication divide and strengthen partnerships between homes and schools.

All parents play a crucial role in supporting their children.

Source: Primary English Teaching Association of Australia (PETAA)

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