Maths teachers, advice please!

[SlavesToTheKitchen]

I'm beginning to think DS might have dyscalculia. He brought home a maths test he did in class today.

I don't know if I should say how old he is before asking what you think or to ask what age you think he is!

I would guess Y2/Y3.

Can he do the same sums if they were in columns?

I’d say year 2/3. He’s definitely got an issue with understanding place value, but it’s not enough to say whether it’s dyscalculia or not.

Not a teacher but have some experience with helping kids who don't get maths. It could just be the rubbish method he is trying to use.

Honestly, trying to break it down like that is asking for trouble.

Can he use number lines?
Have you tried using 10p and 1p coins?

I agree with the above poster. He doesn’t have an understanding of place value, without which it is impossible to do partitioning and column calculation. You need to get right back to basics with some Dienes equipment and arrow cards, and teach him how to split the numbers properly into tens and ones, before he can start adding them together again. Judging from the test I would say Y1/2. I would speak to the teacher, as he’s clearly been moved on to more complex tasks before he has mastery of the necessary skills to to complete them.

There’s nothing wrong with the method, it’s partitioning, it’s a perfectly good method for teaching addition in KS1. It’s just that this child isn’t ready for it.

He's having a good go, he's not sure of place value. We use partitioning. It looks like he needs reinforcing of the method and place value before he starts again.

I know it's a perfectly good method, but not if he doesn't get it.

I'm really not convinced that some of the 'interim' methods taught for maths are worth it. My eldest just ended up being totally confused by methods that had so many steps she was bound to go wrong somewhere. (Though to be fair she turned out to have dyspraxia).

OP, does he do number lines and can he add with them? Can he add money? maybe do the questions with 10p and 1p coins and then show how it works with the partitioning method.

It looks like he’s misunderstood a method they have been taught, probably partitioning - the third question he’s just used common sense and counted on.

He's 10 next month.

Can he use number lines? Erratically

You need to get right back to basics with some Dienes equipment and arrow cards, and teach him how to split the numbers properly into tens and ones, before he can start adding them together again
Been doing that for the past three years...

Age 5-6yo.
Partitioning is very hard to understand at that age. Personally i prefer going straight for column addition then working on the understanding. Imo it's too abstract.
My dc of 7yo is finally starting to get 2digit add/sub like this.

Does he do column addition. ?

Ah. That’s a very different thing if he’s 9. I would also have thought yr 1/2. What does his teacher think?

Dyscalculia - it’s debatable as to whether this actually exists - a brain based issue that causes specific difficulties with numbers.

Obviously some people find maths very difficult, but that doesn’t mean that they have dyscalculia, it may be that they were taught very badly when they were younger and progressed too quickly, or they may have other learning difficulties such as memory issues.

I’ve been a secondary maths teacher for 14 years and the amount of attention, training, research etc into dyscalculia I’ve been given, come across or seen discussed among maths teachers is, to my best recollection, zero.

Can your DS do column addition? Does he have any idea of the size of numbers to realise that 17+6=83 is obviously wrong?

He has a poor understanding of place value. Would it be worth asking school to do some maths recovery with him if possible?

Can your DS do column addition sometimes.

Does he have any idea of the size of numbers to realise that 17+6=83 is obviously wrong?

Not consistently.

If he has a question like:
Tara has £20. James has £5 less than Tara. How much money does James have?

He doesn't grasp that the answer has to be less than 20.

As a teacher I would ask him to attempt the next few questions and ask him to explain what he is doing any why. This will enable you to identify where his difficulties are and then you can go from there. At this age I would have taught a range of methods and would always encourage the child to use the one that worked best for them.

Not a maths teacher but taught both mine a lot of primary maths. I found it best to start at a level they can get almost 100% right before tackling anything they find difficult to get them confident.

When mine were little I used actual coins / food to demonstrate. Also when in a shop I would get them to help pay so in the shop each night they would have £1 give the shopkeeper one item (e.g. crisps) and they would guess the change then get the change.

Squared paper may make it easier to understand and one set of figures above the others.

Also found the Goldstar and Carol Vordemann workbooks very good, as well as Mathletics excellent though both mine were very mathematical so different ones might work better - somewhere like WH Smiths will have a range.

I never particularly used methods school used - I found once child understood they were confident. The only slight issue with this is sometimes they mark partly on method and mine get frustrated with that at times when their answer is right but often they can adapt to the other method and it means they know what answer is.

I don't know about dyscalculia but with dyslexia its using different methods helps. I think with maths a lot of it is confidence, believing you will work it out, and having someone to help them and praise when they get it right /nevermind when its wrong. We used to always have hot chocolate with it. I also would not give a calculator, had friends who did this - gives the child the impression they cannot work it out themselves.

He’s unlikely to be given a calculator in ks2 since he won’t be allowed to use one in SATs

However I suspect a year 5 child who has no consistent sense of number is going to eventually end up relying on a calculator at some point whether you give him one now or not.

Op, his arithmetic in that test is correct. Is that normal for him of is it just a fluke on this test?

Can you work back to which number skills he has mastered?
Can he count objects reliably; can he look at a small number of objects and tell you how many are there or does he have to count them first (2-4 objects, say)?
How is he with "more" and "less"? If you have real objects to compare can he tell you which group has more in? It sounds like he may need support to link this skill with number size and order.

I hope you can get some skilled assessment and support to define exactly where his difficulty lies. Not a lot of point in pushing on with teaching skills that rely on earlier concepts he is shaky on.

Unfortunately I don't have practical suggestions to give you; just remember stuff I heard from my mother who was a very experienced remedial teacher and had a few children with issues like this sometimes.

You need a maths tutor pronto

We found Maths Whizz really great for our son who was behind in maths. It does an assessment to find your child's level and starts to teach at that level. If your child hasn't grasped the basics of something it goes right back to that and stays on that level until the child grasps it.
We couldn't afford a tutor and to be honest my son would have found a tutor intimidating (he isn't good with adults), he died love computers though and he thought he was just playing computer games.

www.whizz.com/

I agree with PPs that he doesn't understand place value. He hasn't grasped that the 6 on its own is worth 6 not 60. This seems consistent through his work.

There's a gap somewhere in his very early understanding that needs plugging. The key is finding the gap.

Possible gaps:

• not being able ro count on in single digits
• not being able to count on beyond 10
• not knowing that 20 something is above 10 something (ie can he order the tens)
• confidently order units
• know quickly which is smaller or bigger with units eg that 8 is more than 2 without having to spend a lot of time thinking

If he hasn't grasped the ideas of ordering or smaller and bigger then place value is a step too far.

He's obviously finding Maths very difficult. Have school given you any ideas?

He appears to be able to add fine, its he's adding the wrong numbers.

I would get him to add the numbers in the units place first

so with 17 + 6

add 7 and 6 first
then put a line through the 7 and the 6 to show they have been used.
He then has a 1 left in the tens place and nothing in the other so 10 left.

That's what we did at school in the olden days (though on squared paper one on top of each other so easier to see.)

I've known some children make massive progress with tutors, mine learnt loads from Mathletics (Maths Whizz is good too).

Just another thought, do you know what the focus of the test was? I’d it wasn’t partitioning & recombining then he’s chosen an odd method for the questions he’s shown the working for.

Looking at those questions I’d say it’s been designed carefully to test a range of strategies. That might highlight that picking an appropriate strategy is something else he struggles with.