Parents, I would advise you not to stand idly by in relation to Maths; you can’t afford to. You may or may not have had a good experience in your own school days with Maths, but you need to leave that to one side now and get stuck in, as “you can help!” It is important to introduce Maths to your child from an early age so that they carry good habits with them into their teenage years. Maths appears in so many different tasks we do during our day; we are performing Maths calculations constantly and aren’t even aware of it.

Young children are like sponges who love soaking up new information and experiences, so there are always opportunities to pass on lifelong skills to them in this subject. By involving them centrally in some of the activities and experiences listed below, you can turn them into amazing future Mathematicians and infuse a love for the subject, without them even knowing. As time passes, they will hopefully view Maths as a fun and challenging subject. The word Maths isn’t mentioned once in the below list, but it is intrinsically linked to them all. Many of these can be reinforced up to early teenage years.

Try opening discussions and involving them in the following day-to-day tasks:

♣ Setting the table for four people.

♣ Wrapping presents.

♣ Sorting and matching socks.

♣ Thinking about quantities and percentages in recipes.

♣ Reading the labels on food products.

♣ Organising notes and magnets on the fridge.

♣ Spotting shapes in the kitchen/garden.

♣ Adding up number plates when travelling.

♣ Noting where basic shapes exist: rectangle, triangle, parallelograms etc.

♣ Spotting shapes in books.

♣ Introducing days of the week.

♣ Introducing time of the day and minutes in a day.

♣ Introducing hours in the day and week.

♣ Introducing months and days in the year.

♣ Introducing yesterday, today, tomorrow, next week.

♣ Clocking numbers on cars, buses, shops, and houses.

♣ Measuring your child’s height and discussing sizes.

♣ Converting their shoe size measurements i.e. between mm/cm.

♣ Regularly using the ‘measure’ words: tall, short, wide, narrow etc.

♣ Playing counting games: Bingo, Snakes and Ladders and Dice.

♣ Making shapes with pasta, crayons, and cut-outs.

♣ Showing them how to use a little ruler.

♣ Setting them little calculation challenges with rewards.

♣ Playing shop with kitchen products and money.

♣ Buying them a toy cash register.

♣ Using full and empty containers to introduce volume in baking.

♣ Comparing toys under size, weight, and shape.

♣ Making patterns with buttons or clothes pegs.

♣ Quizzing them on shapes around the home.

♣ Allowing them to scan the barcodes at the supermarket.

♣ Teaching them to divide treats evenly with their friends.

♣ Asking them to colour in bar charts and graphs.

♣ Showing them labels on food.

♣ Grouping clothes buttons together under size and shape.

♣ Giving them measuring tapes, rulers, watches, jugs, and scales.

♣ Challenging them to add and subtract basic numbers.

♣ Looking out for patterns and linkages in everyday life.

♣ Helping them to work out the change when you buy something.

♣ Downloading simple numerical games and apps for their tablets.

♣ Using food products to teach them about various shapes.

♣ Cutting paper to show how new shapes emerge from original ones.

♣ Setting them little calculation challenges with rewards given for effort.

♣ Discussing about the chance (probability) of an event happening.

♣ Making numbers fun.

Many of the above examples can be integrated into a child’s life from an early age and the sooner they are exposed to this type of learning the better. The secret to you being successful at improving your child’s innate Maths is to take every opportunity to seamlessly introduce it. You do not need to be good at Maths to influence and enjoy these links with your children. Try not to let your own experience of the subject colour the fun and enjoyable learning they can extract here. The key is to allow them to create, complete, think and compute daily, without even thinking it’s actually Maths they are doing. ACE Maths Tuition classes for 3^rd and 6^th years run in Navan Education Centre, Ratoath Community Centre and Online with rolling intake all year round.

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© Joe McCormack 2020