12 Unique Ways on How To Teach Math Better

One of the most common challenges every math teacher faces is wondering how to teach math to their students. Out of all the subjects, math is a unique subject and is perceived differently by every student, and it is an essential subject for all age groups.

Every parent wishes for their child to succeed in math. However, mathematics is completely different from one child to another, and it differs in terms of understanding, usage, application, and difficulty level. 

The subject is highly distinctive, putting more pressure on the teachers to help students understand the subject and apply the concepts correctly. As a teacher, if you are wondering how to teach math to your students, you’re at the right place.

If you are looking for new ways of teaching math to your students, here’s everything you need to know. We’ve got for you 12 simple and unique ways to help students understand and learn math. Let’s get started. 

Creating A Conducive Environment 

If you are wondering how to teach math to your students, the first step is to create a learning environment that is conducive to all types of learners. It starts from understanding the kinds and types of learners in your math class. You can start by speaking to students about the agenda of your session. 

You can start with speaking about the topic that is to be taught for the day and even revise concepts of the previous class or help them recall similar concepts of the previous grade.

In this way, you can start engaging the students, and it will help them to participate actively in the class, which will lead to an increase in practice to get better at the subject. This strategy is not a new way of teaching math but an effective way to make learning math fun and fearless for your kids. 

Offer Multiple Examples 

If you are wondering how to teach math in a simpler way, it is to help students to start visualizing the concept. The best way to do this is to give your students several real-world examples for every concept. This way, you can bring all the learners of different learning styles on one common ground.

When giving examples, students can relate to the concepts better than when compared to studying directly from the book. If you are an elementary school math teacher wondering how to teach math with samples, read “Using Examples In Teaching” to learn more. 

Set Goals For Your Class 

One of the major challenges a math teacher faces is helping students achieve desired results in math. On asking several math teachers how to teach math to students, we found a unanimous answer; is to set learning goals for your students.

The digital co-teacher made with ❤️ by teachers

ByteLearn saves you time and ensures every student gets the support they need

Try for Free

Most students have an inbuilt fear of mathematics, which hampers their performance. When you start setting goals for your students, they find it less of a challenge but rather an opportunity to achieve and outgrow their classmates. 

These goals help students to understand that everyone who works hard can automatically succeed. They also understand that math is not based on real talent but on practice and continuous hard work.

As a math teacher, when you set learning goals for your class, you help instill a growth mindset for your kids. You must help them understand the importance of the subject and the power of learning math, which will aid them in performing and learning better. 

Find Real-Time Connections 

If you are wondering how to teach math in a way that is easier for students to connect with is to help them find real-time connections. This starts by helping students identify math in the world around them.

In this way, they tend to be more drawn toward and invested in the subject. You can help students find books or learning materials with mathematical connections. When students find these connections in their environment, it can help them connect with the subject.

If you are looking for new ways of teaching math to your kids, here are some amazing picture math books you must check out. 

Lay Emphasis On Tests 

As we look at multiple ways to teach math to kids, it is important for a teacher to test their students’ knowledge. A great way to track the progress of your learning goals is to test the students in a timely manner. You can understand the results of your instruction through these tests and assignments. 

You can start by giving students mock quizzes or even set up formative assessments with the help of multiple math tools that are available online. One such tool is ByteLearn, a digital math assistant that helps teachers send out assignments, homework, and even exams with just a few clicks.

You can simply bring all your students on ByteLearn’s versatile platform or connect it to your Google Classroom, which will work wonders for you and your students. Hence, it would help if you plan your tests, quizzes, and assessments while making your lesson plan. You can trust digital resources like Byte and get it done for you! 

Make Room For Experiential Learning 

Nothing works best, like offering students experiences while learning new concepts. Teachers often find themselves struggling with finding how to teach math in an effective yet engaging way. We have understood that chalkboards and worksheets no longer work in the same way. It’s time for teachers to keep the students actively involved during the teaching process. Some activities you can include in your lesson are as follows; 

• Play-based toys – Building blocks, legos, playdough or molding clay, dice, etc. 
• Math-based games include Math Hopscotch, 101 Dice (In and Out), War, Monopoly, and many more. 

You can also find many more modern teaching methods to incorporate into your math class. 

Encourage Collaborative Learning 

One most meaningful way to teach math to kids is to encourage collaborative learning. When looking at how to teach math to students, most middle school math teachers found that collaboration and cooperative learning works best.

You can do this by splitting your class into equal-sized groups. In a team, they learn the skill of problem-solving and can communicate their ideas to one another. This also allows students to think and know each other’s approaches to a mathematical problem. They are given more freedom to think flexibly and provide solutions based on their strengths. 

Give Practice Assignments

As we mentioned earlier, math is a subject perceived differently from one student to another. There needs to be constant practice for a student to get better at it. As a teacher, you must always end your class by summarizing the concept.

In addition, you must always ensure that your students have some practice sums to go back home and work on the concepts taught in the classroom. While preparing these assignments for homework, make sure they have a combination of questions with different difficulty levels.

These practice assignments or homework given to students must aim to increase their understanding of a concept and not make it much harder. 

You may also like to read- fun math questions

One Problem, Multiple Solutions 

Upon discovering different ways to teach math, we realized how diverse the subject is. Math is a highly versatile subject, and even though the concepts are the same, how it is taught and learned changes from one person to another. As a math teacher, you will solve multiple sums daily. 

We all know that every problem has different ways of arriving at the final answer. Hence, within the given duration, try to show your students all the different ways they can use to arrive at the final answer. When multiple solutions are given for a problem, students will grasp the solution that is more relevant to them.  

Provide Room For Understanding

This is less of a technique to teach math and more of a medium to make learning math meaningful. As a middle school math teacher, ensure you do not just focus on helping students memorize formulas and concepts but rather direct students towards understanding the concepts.

Introduce a math concept in your classroom and ask students to express their initial thoughts on the topic. Open the room for students to create and express their understanding and strategy to solve the problem. In this way, they have a much long-term grasp of the concept rather than barely memorizing it. 

Communicate With Students and Parents 

We have all heard the saying ‘Communication Is Key’ for all teachers. As much as we pay emphasis on teaching the subject, it is also important for you to communicate with your students and parents in a timely manner. Communicating with your students helps to understand how they feel about math. 

Communicating at frequent intervals can also be a new way of teaching math simply because it acts like a reality check. When you communicate with your parents, you can get a deeper insight into the positive and negative aspects of the subject.

Communicating frequently with students can help track the subject’s progress, and you can figure out the areas or concepts with which they need more hand-holding or even find something completely new about your students. 

12. Patience, Patience, Patience

Lastly, you need to instill the value of patience into your students. Students must be made to understand that nothing can be mastered overnight, and it needs constant practice and perseverance. Given the nature of the subject, math can be difficult for many students. Hence, you need to be patient and take one step at a time, which will help them remove the subject’s fear. 

Takeaway:

We have spoken about all the simple and unique ways that you can use it to teach students about math. As already mentioned, math is a highly interesting subject; however, the most interesting part about it lies in how it is taught and learned.

There is a pool of ways to make learning math more fun and interesting for your students. With the new academic year in place, start engaging your class and help your students understand math better with ByteLearn. Get started with Byte today!