No Specialist Knowledge Required!

Whatever your view is on testing children using SATs, most parents will agree that they want their children to achieve the expected standard in Maths, Reading and Writing as they leave Key Stage One and move up into Key Stage Two (or ‘The Juniors’). This means that they are on track for their age and ready for the challenges of Year 3 and beyond.

There are definitely ways that parents can support and encourage their children in all subjects. Below, I give my top five ways of helping your child in Maths- no specialist knowledge required!

Money, Money, Money

My Little Lady invariably sees me paying for things with card. If I need cash, I have to scrabble around for it! Children need to be able to recognise the different values of coins so I have to make an effort to ensure that we firstly have some coins at home and secondly play with them. A favourite activity for us is setting up a shop with jars, tins and packets from the kitchen cupboard. We use real coins, a toy cash register and a purse. We take turn to pretend to visit the shop and spend money. There is so much learning going on in this activity but it’s all through play. By the end of Key Stage One children need to be confident in using coins to make different amounts of money. To reach they expected standard they should be able to make the same amount of money in different ways.

Telling the Time

This is a tricky skill! Imagine if you are a child who is struggling and uncertain on telling the time within a class full of 30 children. The teacher usually has a large clock at the front and each child has a mini clock. The struggling child is lucky if their teacher spots them and is able to intervene but in a class of 30 they won’t get much individual attention. This is something that you can provide as a parent. Little and often is definitely best when learning to tell the time. Begin with some times that your child feels confident with before stretching them on. To reach the expected standard at the end of Key Stage One, they must be able to tell the time to 15 minute intervals. To exceed the expected standard and be working at greater depth, children must be able to tell the time to 5 minute intervals.

Real Life Maths Problems

Another skill needed to exceed the expected standard and work at greater depth is to reason and solve word problems. This is a huge jump for many children. After reading a word problem, they have to be able to work out what calculations are needed to solve it. They may be required to use one or two calculations within one question. An example given in the Department for Education guidance on this is:‘Which has the most biscuits, 4 packets of biscuits with 5 in each packet or 3 packets of biscuits with 10 in each packet?’ They could use drawing to help with working out but children would still have to know to do 4 lots of 5 (4 x 5) and 3 lots of 10 (3 x 10) and then compare which answer has the biggest number. Parents can help by talking about this type of word problem in everyday situations. So that children grow in confidence with using Maths language and tackling everyday problems. For instance:

You need 5 pairs of school socks every week- how many school socks a week is that altogether? 

It’s 2 weeks and 3 days until your birthday. How many days is that in total?

Even if you child is not aiming for greater depth, they will soon need to be solving questions like this in year three and above.

Shapes

Your child has probably known the names of 2D (flat shapes like triangle, rectangle) for a long time. But are there a couple that they muddle up? This could easily be missed in a class of 30, but you will know because you have the benefit of knowing your child’s strengths and weaknesses. You might want to draw the troublesome shape and have a special way of remembering it. For example, hexagons have an x in the name and so does six. Your child will also need to know the names of 3D shapes. However, naming the shapes might be the easy part because to reach the expected standard at the end of Key Stage One children must be able to describe the shapes using words such as vertices (pointy bits or corners), edges (sides), faces (on 3D shapes) and lines of symmetry. The next jump to achieve greater depth is to use these words to compare the shapes. You probably won’t have a nicely kept box of 3D shapes but you will have tins in your cupboards that are cylinders; cereal boxes that are cuboids and dice that are cubes. If you don’t have a triangular prism, you might need to treat yourself to a Tobelerone- all in the interests of Maths of course!

No Working Out Required!

Your child will have done lots of number crunching at school this year and really worked hard on addition and subtraction. In my experience, as a teacher and a parent, this type of Maths at home can cause the most tears and stress for children and parents. “That’s not how Mrs Smith does it!!!!” One way that you can definitely help with addition and subtraction are number bonds. Your child probably did lots of practise in Year One of number bonds to 10. E.g. 6 + 4 = 10 OR 3 + 7 = 10. By the end of Key Stage One the expectation is that they can get lots of other facts from knowing a single number bond.

For instance, give you child the fact 8 + 2 = 10. Don’t ask them to work it out. It’s a free fact, no working out involved.

Can they switch it around to know 2 + 8 = 10.

Can they make it a number bond to 20, like 12 + 8 = 20 or 18 + 2 = 20

Can they get some subtraction facts from it, such as 20 – 12 = 8 or 20 – 18 = 2

Try giving them another fact such as 8 – 3 = 5

Can they us it to work out what 18 – 3 be?

Can they make some addition sums from it? 15 + 3 = 18

A Final Bonus Tip

This is perhaps the most important of all. However, you feel about Maths and whatever your childhood experiences of it - be positive and be encouraging. Common sense and many years of teaching have shown me that children who enjoy Maths and believe they can succeed do succeed. Your main role as a parent is to plant the seeds of success.