Vera is on the weaker side when comes to academics, especially when the linguistic part affected both her languages and it is no joke that it affected the learning of all subjects. She has been struggling to pass her subjects since P1 and not to mention Math which requires critical and higher order thinking skills.
I was relieved that her school had put her in the Learning Support Programme (LSP) and Learning Support Math (LSM) in Primary 1 & 2, to give her more help in a smaller student-teacher ratio setting of not more than 10 students so that adequate attention could be given to this group of weak learners.
Now that she is in Primary 3, I felt more stress coming in. Especially in Math where she will have to come to face to handle heuristic questions and as she levels up, there will be bound to have tricky questions which require more thinking skills into to problem solve.
What I want to see as a parent is her confidence in handling the subjects despite her challenges, having a happy learning journey and not give up trying. Vera has her own way of learning or rather any way that is not rote-learning and she learns better through games and preferably without books.
Recently, I went to attend a Pattern Thinkers workshop by NeuroMath Singapore . This programme was developed to teach the child the skillsets essential to help build and strengthen the ability to problem solve tricky questions through a scaffolding framework.
1. Permutations
2. Consecutive Numbers
3. Assumption
4. Logical Deduction
5. Pattern Sequences
6. Equations
In lesson 3, the level of difficulty got slightly more challenging, I did not need to worry about the challenge for her because she has already learned the skill from the first two lessons.
I have no problems getting Vera to practise this on a daily basis. Many would have said that they have no time to sit the child through but all I took was only 5 minutes or less to allow her to play with the set. Why play? I know that books will put her off, this kit contains resources that did not make her feel dreadful about going through the process. The resources were nothing like boring assessment books and allowed her to grasp the concept in a fun way. The win was, it helped her to relate to those tricky math questions without difficulty! I wished during Xav's lower primary days, this programme was available!
I look at it in the way that it is like brain gym (I took up a course on this before wanting to help Vera cope with her focusing issues and anxiety if any) or to make it simpler, a person going to the gym daily. Through daily training, it trains and builds up the muscles.
Similarly, you understand how the daily execution of the exercises could strengthen cognitive functioning, Pattern Thinkers is very much the same. It trains the mind and the cognitive function. For Vera after she learned the systematic way, I used a timer to work on her speed, we aimed to complete the task faster than the previous attempt each time. After all, we need speed and accuracy in Math, especially when tackling tricky problem sums during the national exam.
The use of the xylophone for one of the exercises was a struggle for us initially. Why us, I train with Vera so as to make her feel that she is not alone, mummy is learning with her too! I was happy to see her progress. After a few attempts, she got it and to make things more fun for her, using the same concept, I told her to make music using other notes.
This was her reaction during one of the Lesson 3 practices. She told me "Mummy, how come there was not enough yellow chips? " I told her to go check her and find out where the mistake was. And this was her happy face! She was elated to realise that she could pinpoint where her mistake was!
You must be thinking how folding Origami is linked to Math? Lesson 4 was tough for me. Vera has no issues remembering the steps after repeating them a few times of the same step (If you get it now), her working memory is also one of her weak points to work on and it was a relief for me that she managed to remember the steps. The challenging part for us was on the assembling of the modular star. I had to seek help from Don and learnt from him after that after a few failed attempts.
Here's the daddy's girl with the completed modular star! Nothing is too difficult! I am proud to say that Vera managed to list down the 24 permutations much faster than the given time of 3 mins.
It has been a month working on Box 1 which has a total of 4 lessons. Vera learnt at her own pace and in the comfort of home, all we needed to do was to submit the video assignment to Pattern Thinkers Team to go through and they will come back with feedback for Vera.
Even her tutor saw an improvement in her ability to process her thinking and at a faster speed too! And I am proud of her, now she could easily list the 24 permutations in less than 3 minutes.
There is an upcoming webinar on 30th July 2022, for all readers and followers of mine, Neuromath Singapore has kindly offered a complimentary session for you instead of having to pay $19 (usual price). Click on the link to sign up to find out more: https://neuromath.com.sg/pt-serene/
You can also visit the following social media pages to find out more:
Instagram: @neuromathsingapore
About Neuromath
We are a leading centre of Excellence for Math in Singapore with over 20 years of experience in
helping students achieve the marks they truly deserve. We strive to lead the future of math learning,
creating the Next Generation Thinkers and Problem Solvers to enjoy the Triumph of Learning
through Discovery.
Coming from a practitioner where we are able to influence thousands of yet-performing learners to
scale from fail to A, we believe Pattern Thinkers is another proven system of ours that can help
learners learn independently and come to their own individual understanding of mathematics.
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