Scale Problem Sum Questions for Effective Learning
Hi Parents,
In my last email, I shared that for your child to be proficient in Math, he needs a strong foundation of Math Knowledge, Technique and Solving Skills that are broadly summarised in the table below. Amongst the 3, Solving Skills is an the area that schools are not spending enough time on since efforts are largely place on Knowledge and Techniques due to limited classroom learning time.
When you last worked with your child for this year-end exam, you’ll probably recall spending more time unravelling the language of the problem sums (Solving Skills) as opposed to working through the mathematical operations (Knowledge and Techniques). And once your child comprehends the problem statement, he will be able to work through the mathematical procedure almost independently.
This struggle with the language in Math is common amongst students and is also one of the reasons for children to dislike Math. If your child is facing this challenge, he is not alone. Yet, many children once like your child have overcome this limitation by
Learning Right To Perform Right Consistently!
One of the ways to learn right is to provide your child with high quality of instruction from proven and relevant content/curriculum that will build his understanding in terms of mathematical language and concepts. This will apply to the way you assign problem sums for your child to work on. Be mindful of your child’s level of standard and know that children’s learning need to be scaled up accordingly and competency is developed over time through reinforcements. To illustrate, one of the ways is to group the questions to be given to your child by level of difficulty to scale up his understanding and in so doing you are also building his confidence.
In the question below, you will notice that while both questions look similar and can be represented as dividing 24 by 6, one is more wordy requiring the children to think about them in different ways using quite different approaches to solve each of them.
Level 1 Question:
June has 24 pens. She wants to put 6 pens into each bag. How many bags will she need?
Level 2 Question:
June has 24 pens. She wants to put all the pens into 6 bags. If she puts the same number of bags into each bag, how many pins will she put into each bag?
The examples provided is simple to demonstrate that when developing the comprehension skills, do not rush into having your child work on too many varied and difficult question types especially when he is new to a concept. Give your child the time to first strengthen his foundation and build competency through the solving of problem sums by levels.
Yes, time is needed for you to identify, classify and sometimes modify the right content for your child to learn right. And time is also needed for your child to be trained to perform right. And you will notice the change when he starts to work on his Math eagerly, independently and perform well consistently.
Elsa Tan
Co-founder onSponge
P.S Using the onSponge +hinkingMath curriculum and approach, Oodles Learning focuses on helping students to build the essential skills needed to score A/A* for Math.
Since 2012, Oodles Learning has helped thousands of students to excel in PSLE Math Exams. Currently, there are 10 centres island-wide, with more centres opening in the very near future. Click here to view Oodles Learning Open House schedule happening this November.
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In my last email, I shared that for your child to be proficient in Math, he needs a strong foundation of Math Knowledge, Technique and Solving Skills that are broadly summarised in the table below. Amongst the 3, Solving Skills is an the area that schools are not spending enough time on since efforts are largely place on Knowledge and Techniques due to limited classroom learning time.
When you last worked with your child for this year-end exam, you’ll probably recall spending more time unravelling the language of the problem sums (Solving Skills) as opposed to working through the mathematical operations (Knowledge and Techniques). And once your child comprehends the problem statement, he will be able to work through the mathematical procedure almost independently.
What this means is that when your child can
make sense out of the problem statement, he is technically half way to scoring.
make sense out of the problem statement, he is technically half way to scoring.
This struggle with the language in Math is common amongst students and is also one of the reasons for children to dislike Math. If your child is facing this challenge, he is not alone. Yet, many children once like your child have overcome this limitation by
Learning Right To Perform Right Consistently!
One of the ways to learn right is to provide your child with high quality of instruction from proven and relevant content/curriculum that will build his understanding in terms of mathematical language and concepts. This will apply to the way you assign problem sums for your child to work on. Be mindful of your child’s level of standard and know that children’s learning need to be scaled up accordingly and competency is developed over time through reinforcements. To illustrate, one of the ways is to group the questions to be given to your child by level of difficulty to scale up his understanding and in so doing you are also building his confidence.
In the question below, you will notice that while both questions look similar and can be represented as dividing 24 by 6, one is more wordy requiring the children to think about them in different ways using quite different approaches to solve each of them.
Level 1 Question:
June has 24 pens. She wants to put 6 pens into each bag. How many bags will she need?
Level 2 Question:
June has 24 pens. She wants to put all the pens into 6 bags. If she puts the same number of bags into each bag, how many pins will she put into each bag?
The examples provided is simple to demonstrate that when developing the comprehension skills, do not rush into having your child work on too many varied and difficult question types especially when he is new to a concept. Give your child the time to first strengthen his foundation and build competency through the solving of problem sums by levels.
Yes, time is needed for you to identify, classify and sometimes modify the right content for your child to learn right. And time is also needed for your child to be trained to perform right. And you will notice the change when he starts to work on his Math eagerly, independently and perform well consistently.
Elsa Tan
Co-founder onSponge
P.S Using the onSponge +hinkingMath curriculum and approach, Oodles Learning focuses on helping students to build the essential skills needed to score A/A* for Math.
Since 2012, Oodles Learning has helped thousands of students to excel in PSLE Math Exams. Currently, there are 10 centres island-wide, with more centres opening in the very near future. Click here to view Oodles Learning Open House schedule happening this November.
Unsubscribe