InfoGuide4Parents.com

Math word problems are frequently used to gauge students’ ability to decipher pertinent information and also to assess students’ ability to use their analytical and mathematics skills to solve problems. Math word problems are often used to relate mathematics to real life situations. For instance, Physics applications, finance applications, Economics applications, surveying and other fields heavily rely on Mathematics.

Consequently, word problems appear in a lot of standardized exams as well as in everyday assignments that students face. Standardized exams like the SAT test love word problems since they can be used to integrate many fields of mathematics; and they are a higher order thinking assessment tools.

In today’s mobile society, people seem to be picking up and moving around more than ever - one in five families per year, according to some studies. The average worker can expect to change careers several times during her or his life, and changes in location often go along with that great new job - research has shown that many employers consider willingness to move a major factor in weighing an underling’s potential for advancement. Though we’re tempted to think of relocation as an incidental factor - the tiny string attached to a career change - it’s a big deal. Relocating, especially across state or national boundaries, can throw your life into upheaval. In the best circumstances it’s likely to be expensive, time-consuming, physically challenging, emotionally painful, and tedious; in the worst, it can be a nightmare.

We all use math in our everyday lives. Many of us consider ourselves to be “math phobic”, “math deficient” or “mathematically challenged.” Perhaps we communicate these ideas to our children or perhaps we and our children truly are any or all of the above. In educational institutions, where math is taught largely in the abstract and without practical application, particularly in the elementary grades, this inability comes as no surprise.

Have you ever tried to teach someone how to tie shoelaces by describing the process? Did you learn to cook pancakes by reading about the process of mixing flour, eggs, milk, and baking powder? Was your driver’s license awarded to you after reading an article on how to parallel park? Let us hope not.

Parents often ask why their children are doing poorly in math, particularly in grades 2-6. For young children, abstract quantities can be daunting, especially when taught in the context of skill drills. Many children do not find immediate meaning in numbers as symbols, although that is what parents and math teachers hope to convey to them.

Children in third through fifth grades who are having difficulty with procedural operations, such as long division and multi-digit multiplication, very often have not had any kinetic activity associated with the learning of the multiplication tables which are the basis for their computations. They become distracted from the procedures of multiplication and division by their concern over the “blank space” in their knowledge of multiplication tables and they lose momentum.

Does your toddler appear to have a streak of your genius? Do you seek strategies to enrich your toddler’s intellectual capacity?

Recent research has challenged the conventional notion that small children have native ability to distinguish quantity and to count.

Research by Janellen Huttenlocher, Susan Levine and Kelly Mix indicates that toddlers may not have the native ability to distinguish different items because of the level of their language development skills. Contrary to what “nativists” believe, the research team concludes in their book Quantitative Development in Infancy and Early Childhood, the young child’s ability to count and perform other quantitative tasks is dependent upon related language skills. Children who acquire early language skills are better able to understand and apply tasks related to discrete items such as counting.