Maths Anxiety
Maths Anxiety Symptoms
Maths anxiety is common, particularly amongst the dyscalculia population.
From a young age, we pressure children to learn numbers and be successful at maths. For most kids, failing maths isn’t an option.
Fail maths = fail school.
Fail school = fail life.
So what happens when a child who simply can’t learn math is forced to keep learning?
Maths Anxiety
If you’ve found your way here, then you most likely have negative early childhood memories of math. Whether it be a stern teacher who singled you out and labelled you as stupid or a frustrated parent, who try as they may, couldn’t teach you maths and it would all end in tears and frustration.
When we connect any action or thought to a bad experience, it can create anxiety. That is why your hands go clammy, a slight sweat breaks out on your forehead, and your brain gets jumbled, even at the mere thought of you needing to do maths.
We are here to help….so please keep reading on.
Writing down your fears can improve exam results
What causes Maths Anxiety?
THE BIG QUESTION OF WHAT CAUSES MATHS ANXIETY STILL HASN’T BEEN SOLVED BY RESEARCHERS OR SCIENTISTS.
Are people bad at maths because they feel anxious about the subject?
Do people have maths anxiety because they find processing maths ideas hard?
The answer is probably a combination of both depending on the person and their brain development or what’s happening at home, at work or in school life.
However, research has proven that if we write down our maths fears or do breathing exercises before needing to work with numbers our ability to do math improves. This is fantastic news as this demonstrates you CAN do something about maths anxiety and it doesn’t need to be a lifelong affliction — more on the writing technique below.
When does Maths Anxiety first appear?
Scientists and educators until recently thought that maths anxieties first appear when children begin to learn complex maths such as algebra.
However, new studies have established that children as young as age 6 or younger can feel anxious and have negative feelings towards maths.
Researchers found that almost half of the children who participated in the study said that they were at least somewhat nervous about doing maths. Also, children with higher maths anxiety got worse scores on their math tests. Researchers concluded that the relationship between maths anxiety and maths ability develops when we are very young.
We suggest teaching maths through games for people who suffer from maths anxiety. Sites like Table Fables can help us grasp basic maths like NUMBER BONDS, TIMES TABLES, DIVISION and ADDITION.
Table Fables use funny animations with poops and farts to make you laugh and learn. Anything that makes us laugh is brilliant. It’s impossible to feel anxious when laughing.
Early Intervention is key! If your child is showing signs of maths anxiety or struggling with maths, the sooner you address the issue, the faster the problem can be sorted out. If you had problems with your heart you wouldn’t say “Doctor, it’s ok I’ll fix my heart issues in 5 years, I can live with the heart palpitations and panic for a bit longer!!”.
Don’t let your self-esteem and confidence suffer if you have problems, sort them out sooner rather than later. Prevention is a much easier road than undoing the harm that’s already been done.
Do you remember ever feeling stressed or anxious when a maths teacher asked you a question?
What about maths homework when nothing made sense?
Becoming anxious when faced with basic maths isn’t a great feeling but can be overcome with patience and time.
You are NOT alone. 6-17% of the population suffer from maths anxiety.
Many people fear maths and any situation where maths is required.
If you know you or your child feels anxious around numbers and maths, tell them a little story from your childhood about something that made you anxious (apart from maths and numbers if you have maths anxiety) and how you felt and how you managed to conquer your fears. The very same techniques an be applied to maths anxiety.
Common physical symptoms of Maths Anxiety :
Nervous habits when faced with maths: like excessively rubbing eyes
Tears
Tantrums
Racing Heart
But I still don’t understand what causes Maths Anxiety?
Researchers have two ideas about how maths anxiety may develop:
IDEA 1 :
Those who start school struggling with numbers are more likely to develop maths anxiety. This idea hasn’t been tested yet, but feedback from parents of children with Dyscalculia or Number Dyslexia would suggest that those who develop maths anxiety struggled to learn to count in pre-school.
IDEA 2 :
Maths anxiety develops in children exposed to social situations that affect their thoughts and feelings towards maths. For example, children normally pick up negative thoughts and feelings from parents, teachers or other individuals in their lives.
Studies have shown that teachers with high maths anxiety lead to poorer maths achievements. Unsurprisingly suggesting that the way the teachers act when delivering maths lessons affects their pupils.
WHAT HAPPENS IN OUR BRAIN WHEN WE HAVE A MATHS PANIC?
One idea is that our human brain can only process a certain amount of information at a time. This system is called WORKING MEMORY - this area of the brain holds information to use when doing activities. WORKING MEMORY is where we can think of multiple things at the same time. Thinking of several things at once is essential for maths, e.g. Mental maths:
1. Your brain has to remember the numbers.
2. Your brain needs to work out what steps are needed to solve the problem.
3. You say or write the answer down - ALL AT THE SAME TIME.
Researchers have a theory that when people experience maths anxiety, the anxiety uses up massive amounts of their WORKING MEMORY, not leaving enough space to process the math problem itself.
Maths Anxiety makes your brain function differently
The theory being that if students weren’t so anxious, then they would have more space in their working memory to solve maths problems. In other words, their maths anxiety is causing them to fail repeatedly. Various studies have supported this theory.
Studies have also demonstrated that children’s brains scanned in an MRI machine while completing maths tasks showed that children with high maths anxiety overused an area of the brain called the amygdala, rather than those children who didn’t have maths anxiety.
Also, children who suffer from high maths anxiety underuse two areas in their brains that deal with working memory and mathematical processing compared to those who don’t have maths anxiety.
This leads researchers to believe that those students with math anxiety are massively overusing an area of the brain that deals with anxiety while under using the brain areas designed to help work out mathematical procedures.
MATHS ANXIETY SOLUTIONS
Idea 1 :
The ultimate goal is for students to never develop maths anxiety in the first place. Sites like Table Fables will help children regain confidence or prevent issues in the first instance. Table Fables uses humour and animations to make children laugh while they are learning maths. When a child is laughing and having fun they can’t feel anxious.
Idea 2 :
Research has shown that writing down thoughts and feelings, which would normally clog up working memory or the mathematical procedure areas of the brain with anxiety, has proven to help students that suffer from maths anxiety feel calmer before tests. And guess what? When they are calmer, they score HIGHER on their tests. So make sure you or your child ALWAYS writes down thoughts and feelings before an exam or before maths lessons.
The act of writing down anxieties lets us see that a lot of our worries are unfounded and frees up our brain to concentrate on maths.
A. Get them to write down as many of their fears as possible e.g “I’m scared of failing.”, “This is too hard for me” etc.
B. Take a moment to carefully consider a rational response to each thought based on evidence from your past. For example “I’ve passed exams before, I can do it again.”, “Some questions might be hard, but I will know the answers to many questions.” etc.
Idea 3 :
A different group of researchers showed that if college students with maths anxiety did breathing exercises before tests to calm them down then scores on their test improved.
These studies proved that with intervention maths anxieties can be controlled - which is very reassuring as it means that maths anxiety doesn’t need to be a lifelong affliction.
However, it would be better for children not to develop maths anxiety in the first place. We have discovered that playing board or card games and using websites like Table Fables massively helps children laugh and have fun with maths rather than feeling stressed and anxious.
Causes of Maths Anxiety Summary
Maths anxiety challenges those who suffer from it in class, at work or everyday life and can greatly affect their mental health as they progress through life.
Research has shown that maths anxiety starts early and is affected by social situations as well as brain activity.
However, calming exercises can be used to make sure the correct areas of the brain are functioning properly rather than hindering the mathematical process.
More research is needed into why only some people suffer from maths anxiety and not others. It seems to make sense that those who are more sensitive to the criticism of others or who don’t like to stand out from the crowd, may develop maths anxiety more easily. Until more is understood, most researchers believe that talking to fellow students, parents, teachers and colleagues about your emotional response to maths is the first step to reducing the harmful effects of maths anxiety.