Maths is a subject which if not understood by a student can become a torment for them. Teachers should understand that students’ cannot learn in a stressful and boring environment. Education along with the latest trend in technology is opening new horizons for the students where they can increase their ability to think and visualize beyond imaginations. Maths should be considered as a way of thinking and deriving to the conclusion rather than on only focusing on the final result. Textbooks rarely focus on understanding, its mostly mugging up the formulas and solving the problems. These things cannot help the student in the long run as there is a lot of competition.
Some of the ways that can be followed to have a better understanding of math-related topics are as follows:
Use of Physical Modules
Physical learning modules open a new vision for learners. These modules aim to relate the book concepts, which are not easy to visualize for the students. Physical modules help to build a strong foundation for various concepts which are explained in a difficult language in the books.
Mistakes Should be Encouraged
The sign of active learning is that learners should make mistakes while solving a problem. Learners show far more progress when they try to work out a problem than just listening to the lecture of professors. Also, if the learners understand their mistakes, correcting them on their own and not repeating those mistakes in the next problem is a crucial part of their learning process.
Questions Should be Asked
A sign of curiosity is that when learners try to put up questions. Teachers should take out separate time for the questions of the students. This ensures that their curiosity is geared up all the time. If the “what”, “why” and “how” behind the concepts are explored, then the topic becomes easy to grasp for the students. This encourages students to answer the questions of their classmates.
Use of Visual Models
Once the learners have a basic with the physical modules, some 3D modules can also be explained using the visual graphics model to make them understand more clearly. Topics like the circles, triangles etc. can explain very easily with visual models. For example, showing a child one pizza and then removing the slices from the same by doing this, the concept of a fraction can be easily grasped by the child very easily.
Time-Based Puzzles
Students should be engaged in time-based puzzles. These puzzles help to build their aptitude and improve skills like the pattern recognition, agility, etc. This also helps them to take their own way in solving a problem and which improves their reasoning skills. These puzzles also create an exam environment where they need to answer questions in the given time limit.
To get an experience on how the visual methods are changing the way of learning here’s a video about triangles
