How can I help my child with times tables?

[Knickersinatwistagain]

DS (year 4) is great in all other areas of maths but really struggles with times tables. He has mild autism which effects his executive functioning and processing. Can anyone recommend any resources to help? He uses Times Tables Rockstars but gets stressed by the timer.

I used sticker books I bought in Sainsburys for my two (years ago).

My mum photocopied number squares for me, and I used coloured pencils to colour the squares (50 years ago!).

We are all pretty hot on multiplication, so both of those methods worked!

We have a wooden board with 144 gaps and little square cubes that fit in - on one side it has the sum and on one side the answer. Each times table is colour coded. DS loves it and we spend hours playing with it every day. I think we got ours on Amazon. The brand is something like BigJigs

Carol Vorderman’s maths factor? It doesn’t just focus on times tables though - helps with building fundamental maths skills, so can only help. I would suggest moving away from learning times tables and just build on maths skills. The times tables will come, otherwise it’s just rote learning.

https://www.themathsfactor.com/ - lots of practise and clear explanations.

http://www.percyparker.com/ - funs songs that are fun to sing

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Numicon-Box-80-Shapes/dp/0198487274?th=1 though we got them much cheaper through primary school - or similar cubes/rods and lots of play to work them out a lot.

I used to do a few minutes on regular car journeys. Maybe ten sums per journey. You’ve then got a captive audience.

i also had a times-table cassette in the car and used that (dc now young adults). It used to say 4x5 is, and then leave a gap before the answer (I’m sure there’s online resources available).

Notvsure if it’s changed now, but when my dc were at school, they were taught times tables by saying 4, 8, 12 etc. ie. No context to the maths, so I ensured that I made must realise that it’s 4x3 = 12. Also to stress the equal sign because many kids don’t fully grasp that equals means equal.

Do you know the finger trick for the 9 times table?

https://www.wikihow.com/Use-Your-Fingers-to-Do-the-9s-Times-Tables

Use 'concrete objects' like dried beans or small bits of Lego, all the same colour. If it's the 3 times table then make 10 piles of 3 beans in a row or down like a column, then show them you add on 3 each time, it's 3 'lots of beans/lego/counters..' and the numbers 'go up in 3's' counting on 3 each time. Write the sum out under or beside to link the number fact to the skill. TTRockstars can be too much pressure for some and you need to be pretty secure in the skills to cope with it, language is tricky too. Go old school to make it make sense. Many can't connect the numbers in the totals of times tables to what the skill is, eg groups of the same value added together. Let them take their time with it.

My son struggles, so we bought a times table game from Waterstones, it's like a pack of cards, a few different versions. One focused on the 5/10/2s. That was a good starting point and we treated it as a fun game to get him to associate it with good feelings and confidence.
The timer on rockstars was a panic inducer. I made him a massive chalk board, put it on his wall and wrote down ones for him to answer in his own time. I bought times tables books and marked them, what helped most was practicing together. Little and often.

We had a CD with songs. It was ok! We used to have a ‘penny pop quiz’ once in a while - ask a few sums and award a penny (or rather 10p) per correct answer. We’d write it down in a book and at the end of the week give him his ‘earnings’. He was so competitive he’d be demanding ‘penny pop quiz!’ We still do it - general knowledge, 70s bands… (he’s 19 now and it has us in stitches!).

We don’t do maths as he’s studying it at uni and it’s not fair on me.

Honestly my dd really struggled to remember these too! We tried posters on the walls , fun written tests... rewards.... nothing worked. Then one day, we tried making up a song, each times table had a different melody.
I don't know how it happened but something just clicked with her.. she managed to remember them through song.. worth a try

Try Squeebles. My child also was stressed by the timer in TT Rockstars but liked the collecting the Squeebles. We also use Squeebles for spellings.

@MissingMoominMamma

you just brought back a memory from 48 years ago!!

@Knickersinatwistagain

using maths papers to make times tables grids, colouring in the squares, then you can see the relationship between the numbers! I'd have to really think about what we did, you'd be better off googling it! But the visuals were effective.

if it's just the odd one he gets suck on, write it somewhere unusual. The very bright 18yo here still 'sees' '7x9=63' written on the icy inside of the windscreen & various other ones in odd places.

Back in the 80s we had a cassette that turned each TT into a song. I quickly learnt each one perfectly as a result of that tape!

if it's just the odd one he gets suck on, write it somewhere unusual

7 x8 I always got stuck on (have maths a-level) always worked it out (7 x7) 49 +7 every time - but maths factor had a tip for kids that stuck with me

5678 - 56=7 x 8

Though my younger two are so fast they aren't thinking it's automatic instant recall and that was just practise - timetables just came up so much in all areas mathsfactor covered the odd tricky ones for them just got automated.

Kumon worker for my daughter who was a year behind her peers in maths in yr 5, she'd caught up by end of yr6 and is now in yr7 and extended in maths. Not cheap but really worked for her.

Times Fables changed our lives!

Times Fables: Learn your times tables in as little as a week [3rd Edition] https://amzn.eu/d/5vRgISO

Daughter was really struggling and then she just clicked with this and it all started to stick.
She does TTRS every day now too.

Should also have said daughter is autistic too and we don't do the timer on TTRS and she gets very upset with it.

We chant them on the way to school over and over again. And now I spot check them and just keep going in about it. Y6 here.

We had an app called Times Tables: Maths is fun!
You can learn the Tables individually (visual & sound) and then set them as tests either as grid, free or multiple choice. Again choosing which ones to do like 3 & 6 timetable together ... and then show at the end which ones were wrong.

Both my DC liked it as it wasn't sstressfulas no timer or other features like X amount of mistakes and start again!

The best thing I ever did was get a book called Harry's Magic Tables. All 3 of mine learned very quickly from that. And DC 2 is autistic and also got very stressed with timers.

It's a book using rhymes and pictures and involves learning only the minimal amount, eg you learn 6x5 at the same time as 5x6 so not treating them as different times tables. It's hard to describe but the method is genuinely brilliant.

@PTSDBarbiegirl suggestions are similar to what we did with my autistic ds. “Lots of” with counters is a very helpful way to let them see it in RL.

Neither of my dc can cope with the TTRS timers

There is a finger trick for 6,7,8,9,10 x tables. I never learned my x tables and still use my fingers now.

We use times tables rock stars at school. It is an app. Also we do a daily practice with 20 questions because it is something the children just need to learn and sometimes they just need to over learn them.

We found songs worked for us my son too, though he learnt some more quickly than others, based on how fun the song was!

Another website with free resources and low cost subscription is Math-Center