If you’ve ever been on holiday in a non-English speaking country, you may have seen an English person saying something to a local that they didn’t understand. As the local indicates their non-comprehension, the English person says the same thing several times over, sometimes louder, sometimes slower and occasionally over gesticulating, while using distorting mouth movements, none of which adds to the local’s understanding. Now imagine a scene in a classroom anywhere in England, where a child is sitting in a maths class listening to the teacher explain an equation. The child doesn’t understand, so the teacher explains it again. The child still doesn’t understand, but this time does not ask for help, as they don’t want to look stupid in front of their friends and know they won’t understand the explanation anyway. The child learns to depend on their friends and this masks much of their misunderstanding.
However, when the child is tested they obviously perform poorly and the cycle starts again – explanation equals non-understanding or on some occasions the child does understand, but only for the time the teacher is with them. They cannot retain the information easily on their own so every time the class moves on, the child is left further and further behind. Now the child does not have the building blocks for more complex maths in the future. I was that child and I understand so clearly today, after years of struggling, how I learn numerical concepts and guess what? I am absolutely fine at maths and have even held senior leadership roles responsible for funding, audits, budgets and lots of ‘maths’!
Many students within Colleges who have not passed maths and are repeating it over and over again, desperately reaching for that ‘C’ grade that still eludes many. They say the same things – the teacher speaks too quickly, we don’t understand the explanation being given to us, we need to know practical examples of use, we like to see the big picture, we need it broken into small pieces that work for our brain, we like to see things visually, with pictures, diagrams and images to explain numerical concepts, it helps if we move around and do activities to understand and finally we need a ‘WHY’, why do we need it? They learn maths very differently to those people who are very good at it. They cannot learn maths if it is taught in the way it is taught to people who ‘get it’.
Moving toward solutions
This lack of understanding, poor retention of information and low motivation is a problem I have encountered within many colleges. When I watch lessons and speak to staff, one thing is very clear, if you found maths easy to learn and are good at it, it’s likely that you’ll battle to teach people who just don’t get it. You may as well be speaking a foreign language, because the information is not going in and if it does, it isn’t being retained.
Teachers are so frustrated and really want to help students through their GCSEs. There is no lack of passion on their part – quite the opposite, many love maths so much they really want people to embrace it and love it too. But it can be wearing and can impact on job satisfaction when they cannot see the fruits of their labour. The result is staff and students who are stressed, all working against the clock and all under pressure to ‘perform’.
Looking at the individual components of this issue and exploring what has worked for staff and students, I believe we have only scratched the surface and that there is much more to do to fully engage these types of learners and see much higher achievement levels.