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Maths anxiety starting year 5

2 replies

MOOTZ · 17/08/2018 06:44

My DD is 9 and suffering badly with maths anxiety. We’ve tried tutoring with a very kind tutor this last year and with him she’s fine. However, when she’s put in a situation at school where she believes she cannot do something she falls apart. . This becomes debilitating for her in that she cannot speak, complains of physical pain such as stomach aches and tends to just fall apart and cry. I’m really concerned that this is affecting her performance at school. It’s really evident when she’s faced with maths she finds tricky. Her teacher has put her on the guided table and gave her a below expected for her end of term result. I think her maths is ok but it’s reallynot when she’s under pressure. Both DH and I are really concerned. There’s lots of pressure on our little ones from a really young age and anxiety issues at such a young age really concern me Any advice? Thank you 😊

OP posts:
noblegiraffe · 17/08/2018 12:05

Is it just maths that has an effect or is it just more evident when she does maths? i.e. has she got a general fear of failure and a need to be perfect?

My DS has issues where if he can’t do something, or thinks he can’t do something he refuses to try, or if he tries something and makes a mistake he gives up. We have done a lot of work with him on his mindset and general resilience and the mantra ‘practice makes better’. We refer to previous things that he thought he couldn’t do but managed eventually. We talk about how much practice it takes to get really good at something and when we see someone really skilled at something, how much work they must have put in.
I also started teaching him how to juggle, with the first juggling move being the one where you drop a ball on the floor and pick it up because you do an awful lot of ball dropping when learning to juggle and it’s fine, you just pick the ball up and keep trying. It’s important to see mistakes as part of the learning process rather than a catastrophe.

One thing I’ve found useful with pupils with issues around perfectionism is to let them do their maths on a mini-whiteboard instead of a book - any mistakes can be wiped away rather than being permanent.

TeenTimesTwo · 17/08/2018 20:11

Does his tutor only cover things he can do or has been taught at school?

I have had some success with my DDs with showing them stuff 'oh, I don't really expect you to get this, but I wanted to show you anyway'. This gives them permission to not understand, so they are more open to learning something, and, when they cover it at school they think 'I know something about this' which makes it easier to take in what the teacher says. (I think this is similar to 'flip learning').

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