With the educational crisis brought about by the pandemic, children are spending more time at home compared to classrooms. Many institutions have adopted home learning, where students continue with their education at home. Of importance is for parents to be involved and offer support to their children.
A good example is the CBSE school in Dubai. The institution encourages parental involvement in the learning process, especially during this period, where most learning occurs at home. As parents grapple with consequences brought by Covid-19 in the education sector, there is confusion as to how to deal with home learning.
Studying some subjects proves to be challenging for students. In particular, mathematics needs creativity for children to get a good grasp of the concepts and enjoy the learning process at the same time. Some of the games that parents can use to help children enjoy mathematics include:
- Time telling activities
Telling time is a fun math game. Let your child learn how to figure out the length of time it will take to do something. You can ask them questions about daily schedules, like it takes us 20 minutes to get to church. What time will we arrive if we depart from home at 9.00 a.m.?
You can use hands-on activities such as designing a watch or clock clip cards to teach your child how to tell time to the nearest minute, half-hour, and hour.
- Counting games
Counting games help children to understand the basics of numbers. To play, you can have your child count everyday objects around them.
Take a shirt and tell the child to count the number of buttons on the shirt. You can also use fruits like apples. Put in a bag or tray and have the child count them one by one. To start with, use small numbers like five, and add as the child embraces the challenge. With time, they will master the art of counting small numbers. This will give them the skill to count large numbers.
- Sorting coins
Sorting coins is an easy and exciting game for children to play. You will also get a chance to teach your child the different variations of coins and their worth.
To play the game, you will need a bag filled with different types of coins. You will need at least four bowls to use for sorting out the coins. On a table, set the four bowls and the bag of coins. Limit the number of coins to 10 or 20 for a start.
Let the child sort and place the coins in each of the bowls by type. If it is nickels, dimes, pennies, or quarters, the kid should place each in the correct bowl. The child can also sort the coins based on their values.
When the sorting activity is over, help your child identify and differentiate the coins into their correct categories and values.
- Finger game
A finger game is a simple math activity that you can use to help your child learn simple arithmetic. The only materials you need are your hands.
To play, put your hands behind your back. Come up with a tune of chanting the numbers. You can say: fingers, fingers, fingers, 1,2,3,4, how many do you see? You can show your hands to your child, holding up different fingers on each hand. For example, display three fingers on your right hand and two fingers on your left.
Use different combinations and play the game repeatedly until your child masters the art of showing five and ten in different ways.
- Rolling the dice
Quite a fun and simple math game to enjoy with your kid. You only need one piece of dice, a pencil and a sheet of paper. The game’s objective is to score anything close to 101, and none of you should go over the score.
To play, you will take turns to roll the dice with your kid. For each roll, you can choose to record the number as one or a multiple of ten. For instance, if you roll a 3, you can record it as a 3 or a 30. You will keep recording your total as you play.
One aspect of this game is that it helps a child to generate math strategies at the back of their minds. As you play, they will start thinking of the next numbers they want to roll to win the game.
Math is an easy and funny game. Do not dread the subject. Build a positive attitude towards the subject both for you and your child. You will be surprised to discover that you apply it more often than you think. Love the subject and make it an automatic skill for your child. It will help to improve other aspects of their academic performance.
