Ep 218 | NO CALCULATORS ALLOWED! Preventing math meltdowns

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Learning what they need to know and what they don't need to know. This is the first part of our process. But as we move forward into their sessions, once they enroll with us, homework time is part of every session that they attend. So we're solving the missing pieces as part of it, but we also want to make sure that they're ready for tomorrow's test every time that they bring us something and share something with us so that we can hit both sides of that.

SPEAKER_02 0:30

Welcome to the Voices United in Education podcast. Each week we showcase the teachers, administrators, and community members who go the extra mile to contribute to the success of every child in Escambia County. You'll meet the real people behind the titles and learn about the amazing resources to support your child's success. Tears at homework time. Oh, they are real. And math homework can be the worst. A parent would feel fortunate just to help their child get a passing grade, but fun, hmm. Fun with math may be a distant thought for parents, but not for my next guests. They're the owner and center director of Mathnasium, a math-only learning center to help kids K through 12 catch up, keep up, and get ahead. Today they're going to share what math tutoring actually looks like. And spoiler alert, it does not involve calculators. Solving problems, finding the right angles, and facilitating the exponential growth. Adana Elder and Sheree Goff. Thank you, ladies, for being here. Thank you for having us. Yes, thank you. And I promise that's the end of my math puns. I thought they were very cute. They were the best. Okay, thank you. I appreciate it. Well, let's start at the point of meltdown. Sheree, you're the center director. Is it true that a lot of kids suffer from math anxiety?

SPEAKER_00 1:48

Oh, absolutely. I mean, you can, it's almost palpable when a lot of these students first walk in the door. And our goal is when we first meet them to put them as at ease as possible. So, you know, we make sure they realize that they're not there to take a test, even if their parents have said, Oh, yeah, you're going to take a test today. It's not a test, it's an assessment to see what they know and what they don't know. And so we make sure we tell them there's no grade at the end, they can skip questions. You know, when we alleviate a lot of what they think they're going into, that helps put them at ease. We also talk about what they like to do for fun. Do they have a favorite subject? And a lot of times, even if they have math anxiety, math can still be their favorite subject. And so that's always really interesting to hear that even though they may be having some frustrations with math, ultimately it can still be their favorite subject.

SPEAKER_02 2:39

I hadn't considered that at all. I would think like it would be opposite. But now that you say that, if a student is, I don't know, maybe like a juvenile type A personality, then they might care about it deeply and it's their favorite in that way. But then that puts more pressure on them. And so then they have this, you know, crash happening. Oh, that's really good insight already. So, how would a parent distinguish between a child who just feels like math is a bummer versus like full-on math meltdown? Do you have any idea of the distinction, or is that distinction not relevant?

SPEAKER_00 3:17

Well, I would say, you know, we get a lot of families in that they say, well, my kid just doesn't want to put in the effort. And then we definitely have the families that come in that say, oh my goodness, math is terrible for everyone involved and we need help. And so, you know, they range from the entire spectrum. Like I said, they can come in and they can love math and still be struggling with it and or even be doing really well, but just want that enrichment to, you know, we crash out, you know, as the kids say, they crash out every night during homework and we don't know how to get through it. And, you know, the parent is struggling to explain it. They say, oh, well, the way I did it back in my day, you know, they're not, they're not doing it that way with the new math. And, you know, we get all sorts of different reasons as to why things aren't going well with math. And ultimately, that's what we're here for, is to help them solve that problem.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Yeah, that whole scene that you just described, I know that's all too well. But I love that you pointed out that it doesn't require a meltdown to get support. And I think that is part of the sticky ingredients in this whole thing is a parent may feel like, oh, I can't help my student. And those academic insecurities come to the surface and it doesn't really contribute to, you know, furthering the success of the student. So oh man, that's a lot. I feel like you need a psychology background here to navigate all of this. Adana, you're the center director. What does a math confident kid look like?

SPEAKER_01 4:46

Um, math confident kid is somebody who can come in and answer questions quickly. So you might be confident in some respects, but it turns out that you're really confident only if you can see it on the paper. So, for example, if I give a student 11 plus 12, they'll do one plus two is three, and then one plus one is two. Oh, that answer is twenty-three. That's great. We want them to be confident enough that they can say, well, that's two tens, twenty, and one plus two is three, that's twenty-three. I can do that in my head. I'm super confident and I can do that quickly. I don't need extra support like a piece of paper and a pencil, and certainly not a calculator.

SPEAKER_02 5:25

Interesting. Okay, that is not at all the answer that I thought you were gonna give me. I thought you were gonna say, like, the absence of fear when facing a new math grade level or something like that, which maybe that's included, but you're talking about like actual what what I learned in college is called applied mathematics, which is like confidence in the day-to-day, knowing how to calculate percentages while shopping, understanding, you know, different uh financial impacts on your personal checkbook.

SPEAKER_01 5:54

Sure. But I think that that confidence in going into a new subject matter, a new class, I think we're all not necessarily feeling like we're prepared the first day. We're like, oh my gosh, this is not what I expected to be seeing. So that's gonna happen to all of us no matter what. Anytime you're being introduced to something new, a new grade, a new concept, we don't always start out feeling super ready for that. But what we can do to build that confidence is if you know how to answer questions quickly and know how and why something worked, that's gonna help support everything you do moving forward.

SPEAKER_02 6:30

Okay, this is so interesting because part of what I'm trying to tease apart in my mind's eye is the role of the parent in math confidence and the role of like outside support, like mathnesium, right? Because as I mentioned, you know, sometimes those things can get interwoven and then your ego is the word that comes to mind. That's not a great word, but you know what I mean? It kind of gets involved there. And so what I'm hearing you say is that a parent can help a kid be confident in new situations in general. Like we are gonna show up, we make friends easily, we pay attention, we get along with our teachers, and then the outside role in the case of mathnasium is that quick cognitive confidence of being able to find the answer quickly and smoothly.

SPEAKER_01 7:14

I would agree wholeheartedly. I think the tough thing about parents teaching their students math is sometimes that parents have a misconception about what their students know and don't know. Oh. And so because they're often there at homework time to help them and at the end everybody gets a great answer. That's fantastic. We love that. However, the student needs to know that they can do it without mom there, giving them whether it's just body language cues, whether it is verbal cues to say, yes, you're on the right path, keep going, doing that. We want them to have that support when they first start, but they need to get to where they don't need our help for that. Parents sitting across the table are still giving that support throughout the lesson. And so they think at the end the student knows how to do it. And they may, but they aren't confident because they've still had that parent there.

SPEAKER_02 8:07

I see. Okay, that's another level. What are the other barriers or stigmas that keep parents from getting their child extra help? Do you feel?

SPEAKER_00 8:17

I think a lot of time it's what I run into most of the time is that they don't have time for it.

SPEAKER_02 8:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:24

They're too busy, you know, playing baseball or dancing six days a week or whatever. But ultimately, if they want to get into a good college and get that baseball scholarship or dance scholarship or whatever the case may be, they're still gonna have to have the academia to support their ability to back that up and helping them understand that yes, it's hard to make time for it, but it's important. And if it's important enough to them to achieve those other goals, then they're gonna have to make this just as important.

SPEAKER_02 9:00

So seeing it as an extracurricular activity almost. Okay, so then extracurricular activities are fun. So how are we making math fun?

SPEAKER_00 9:10

So we do our best to make the material as engaging as possible, you know, not just sit down and say, okay, add all these numbers together and have a good time, bias to you later. But a lot of our material has games not only built into them, but we have specific games that will help the student make those connections with the material that they're doing with the game that we use to apply the skills.

SPEAKER_01 9:33

Can you give an example? I mean, one of my favorite games to play with our students is a game we call Heads Up and it's played with cards. And so anytime you can include cards, dice, dominoes, things along those lines, that's gonna be something that's gonna engage the students a little bit longer and teaches them and gives them opportunities to express their knowledge of some of those basic math facts. And so with heads up, I hand you a card and you don't get to look at it, but we'll tell everybody who's listening that the number is an eight. Shh, don't tell anybody.

unknown 10:02

That's what it was.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

So you have an eight, and I put my card up on my head and it has a two. And you're a first grader, and I say, okay, these two numbers added together is ten. And so you have to look at my two and say, Oh, my answer must be eight. I have an eight. Nice job. I love that. It's like they're a math detective. Yes, that's right. And you're teaching addition and subtraction simultaneously. You're supporting those numbers that work well together, those fact families.

SPEAKER_02 10:27

Well, that's application because you're saying this is the problem. How do we back engineer it to find the answer? That's not just like, well, it's eight plus two. You know, it's like it's actually much more complex, higher level thinking.

SPEAKER_01 10:40

Right. Fla flashcards can do a lot, but they're not really fun. Some kids do not like things that are timed. So you might use flashcards to see how many flashcards can you answer in one minute, right? And and that's kind of your goal. But when you can be engaging, we do these at some of the events we do. We do math nights where we go into the schools, elementary schools, and we provide all the games and resources for a family fun night. And my favorite thing at those events to see is kids playing with their parents or playing against their parents in the air quotes there. Because, you know, and the parents will often be very supportive of that and you know, take the time and they're not gonna say two right away because they want Johnny to have the chance to say eight or to see two siblings playing against each other. So it makes it a little bit competitive, makes it a little bit more engaging, and everybody has fun. So, where are these math nights? So we'll do those at almost any school. I say almost because you know we have limited resources in terms of time and uh fundage to be able to make it happen everywhere. But you do it in Escambia County. We do them in Escambia County. So if a school calls us up and says, hey, we'd like to have a family fun night, we do that at no cost to the school. Wow. We just bring in our supplies and ask for volunteers from them to help support each of the stations.

SPEAKER_02 11:53

That's so cool. I love that. And this is also there's more overlap as well with Escambia County Public Schools because I think both of you, right, came to podcast Tipalooza. We did well said, ladies. That was not planned, but ladies and gentlemen. And that's where you met the Take Stock and Children team. Tell us about that.

SPEAKER_00 12:15

So we were looking around, and I think Adana elbowed me and said, Hey, let's go over to that table. Because, you know, I have a school-age daughter, and so she was like, I need you to go ask some questions. And I was like, Okay. So I walked over and wait, like you're a sleeper agent or something. Not quite, but um No, that was exactly what it was like. But so I I went over and I said, Hey, I don't know what take stock in children is, but it sounds really interesting. So can you tell me a little bit about it? And so my daughter isn't old enough yet to because they address middle schoolers, but so my daughter's not quite old enough yet, but they told us all about their program and we told them we would like to support them and we have figured out a way to do that.

SPEAKER_02 12:56

So and specifically, you're uh going to tutor be tutoring three to five of their kids over the summer and school year, is that right?

SPEAKER_01 13:04

Yep, as yeah, as part of our summer program, we've offered to take between three and five of their kids and work with them throughout the summer. And then as we move into the new school year, which will include some new students that become part of their program, we have offered the same thing for the duration of the school year.

SPEAKER_02 13:20

Wow, that's so cool. I'm it warms my heart to know that that happened, even if you were, you know, undercover during that time. So, what is the, for lack of a better word, onboarding process like when a student comes through the doors of Mathnesium, what does that look like? Are they coming in with their the homework that they've been struggling with in hand or like reports from their teacher, or what's that all look like?

SPEAKER_01 13:48

Yes and yes and yes. Pretty much it, what we do is our first goal, like Cherie said when we started, was we start with an assessment. And that's our opportunity to learn a little bit about what your student knows and what they don't know yet. Sometimes we find that that everything we're gonna be working with them on is maybe below the level that their grade would show. Sometimes we find that they have a lot of pieces leading up to this year, but maybe this year got a little bit sticky. And so it's really just, you know, whether it was a teacher who ended up going out on maternity leave three weeks into the school, whether it was, you know, just lack of having the right people in the right places, because sometimes that happens. And our school district is amazing. They do a terrific job of supporting our students, but there are some things that are uncontrollables. And so, what can we do to help support those students who have gotten lost, have got hit those sticky spots? So a lot of times the the beginning of that is it starts with the assessment, it starts with a conversation with the parents. We share with them what that first learning plan is going to look like. If they bring homework in during that assessment, we try our best to slide in a little bit of support for tonight because tonight matters. Tomorrow's test matters. So if we can help them with a little bit of support to make sure that they're feeling more confident when they go into class tomorrow, we love to be able to do that. That is not really our primary goal when they walk in the first time. Our first objective is to figure out what we can do to best support them long term. And the long-term goals mean going back and making sure that their seventh grader is not counting on their fingers anymore, making sure that the ninth grader knows their multiplication facts because those matter when it comes to being able to factor an equation. If you don't have those pieces, a calculator will do it. It will take a lot of trial and error, it will take a lot longer, and you may or may not end up with the right answer. And you definitely don't understand the process yet. So learning what they need to know and what they don't need to know is the first part of our process. But as we move forward into their sessions, once they enroll with us, homework time is part of every session that they attend. So we're solving the missing pieces as part of it, but we also want to make sure that they're ready for tomorrow's test every time that they bring us something and share something with us so that we can hit both sides of that.

SPEAKER_02 15:57

I was wondering if it was like the student just shows up with their homework and that is the air quotes tutoring session of working through it. And that's based on my own experience getting tutoring and math. And that's what we did. But I imagining myself as a child having these more comprehensive enhancements to the understanding, and I can really see how that layered approach would end up for a more math confident student.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

Yeah. That that that that's exactly it. That is what makes us it's what makes mathemasium a little bit different from other tutoring centers. Not that other types of tutoring are not a splendid option for a lot of families, but in in most cases, the problems are a little bit deeper than tonight's homework. Yeah. It's usually there were pieces that were missing before. And much like learning a foreign language, it's kind of the analogy I usually use. You do not want to, if you have only finished French one and I give you the hunchback of Notre Dame in French, you're gonna look at me like I am absolutely crazy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:57

I don't want to know about past participle, whatever. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:00

You might be able to sit down with a French English dictionary and translate it all word for word, but at the end, you don't know the story. Yeah. And we want them to know the story and how to get to the end pieces.

SPEAKER_02 17:10

So, what does the duration look like as far as duration when the student is at the center? For how long are they there? And duration as far as, for lack of a better word, treatment plan.

SPEAKER_00 17:21

Um, what does that look like? So for most of our students, they're there for hour-long sessions. And so they get face to face with an instructor within the first five minutes of sitting down at the table, they get greeted, they, you know, talk about their day, you know, try to have that like introduction conversation so that we, you know, even if we came in having a bad day, you know, we try to put them at ease, get them shake it off. Yeah, shake it off, basically, so that they can get in the, you know, lock-in mindset for what they're doing that day. And so we get them started. If they have homework, we make sure we have we mark that down so we know we started at the right time. And then for about, you know, a good 35 to 40 minutes, they're gonna work on their mathnesia material. And then after that, if they do have homework, then we switch them over and give them a good 15 to 20 minutes of homework time so that they not only get it worked on, we do our best to check it while they're there so they leave with confident and correct answers. And then we're not always gonna get through all of it, but we do our best to give them a good snippet so that they can go home and confidently answer the rest of the questions. And then about the last five minutes of their session, they get checked out. So we clean up their space. They get to spin their reward cards if they have any that they want to spend, they get to spin the wheel if if they have done a mastery check. And so that earns them extra rewards. It's always a fun time in the center because the wheel is very loud. It does distract, but it's a good distraction, I think. You know, everyone's like, okay, what are they gonna spin this time? Are they gonna get, you know, a candy social? Because candy social means everybody in the that's in the center gets a piece of candy. And so we have obviously a ton of kids that love candy social and, you know, just all sorts of different rewards. And so everyone is waiting with bated breath to see what what they're gonna spend during that time. And so it's really exciting. And so we try to start on a positive note and end on a positive note as well and make sure that they're smiling when they leave the center instead of, you know, frustrated, as some kids might be after just a regular tutoring session. Because if if cramming tonight's homework in for an hour didn't help, then they're not gonna leave confidently and being able to move on from that.

SPEAKER_02 19:31

And how long do they normally stay with the center?

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Um our average right now is about 12 and a half months. Yeah. Oh, okay. That's a statistic that we have, but everybody's learning plan is a little bit different. We have a young lady who's with us right now who started coming into the Pensacola Center when she was four. She was not one of our students. Her brother and sister were attending. Oh. And so when she got old enough to be part of our program, she joined us. And now she is I think she's in sixth grade now. Yeah. And she is well above grade level. She's not working with us now because she's struggling. She started with us because her folks saw what it was that Mathasium was had done for her siblings and wanted the youngest one to have this those same opportunities starting earlier.

SPEAKER_02 20:15

I love that. Okay, so we're gonna throw back again to my childhood. Sorry, I really didn't expect this to become such a counseling session, but here we are. When I was a kid, we would mouth back to our teacher, like, why do we need to learn this? Because we have calculators. And he he said he thought he was so clever. Oh, what are you just gonna have? A calculator in your pocket all the time. Well, joke's on you, Mr. McGuire, because I've got a calculator, I've got a camera, I have a a food tracker, and I can order my groceries all from the little thing in my pocket. So how do you overcome this objection now?

SPEAKER_01 20:57

First, I will say you have my entire Encyclopedia Britannica set that was on our bookshelf in your in your phone right now. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. I understand where you're coming from. I I think that the argument is that when we walk into the grocery store, I am not using my calculator to figure out whether I have enough money in my hand or on my credit card to make sure that I can buy those groceries. I'm going through and I'm estimating, all right. So uh you I can only spend $25. I know that's like less than a bag of groceries these days, but uh I have $25, what am I gonna buy? And so we're making those decisions and we're going through and we're saying, all right, it was a dollar for a loaf of bread, it was four dollars for the for the gallon of milk. I am not likely to be putting those in my phone as I'm going along. I just need to be able to keep track of them a little bit. The dozen eggs are probably $18. So where am I at in my 25?

SPEAKER_02 21:48

Oh my gosh, yeah. Are you egg-rich today?

SPEAKER_01 21:52

Right. But really, honestly, so much of math is about teaching good concepts and mental math techniques will help with that. They help us problem solve. It's not that you're gonna have to necessarily know algebra two skills. I mean, the last time I graphed a parabola was probably never. It's better. Other than in the center. Right. So and those skills, again, but even knowing how to do those skills, they still support the critical thinking that's necessary for getting along in life. You might not ever have to graph a parabola, but understanding how those techniques work and understanding the thought process behind them is going to be helpful. And when it comes to things like percentages, I don't want to have to get out my calculator and calculate all of that every time. If I can look at something and I have good techniques that are going to help me get a pretty close number, then that's going to be real life skills. Last time I used algebra was trying to decide if I had enough fuel in my tank to get to mobile and back. So knowing and understanding those kinds of techniques can be helpful.

SPEAKER_02 22:53

So basically, the reason you want to be good at math without using your phone calculator is because you don't want to be that guy. You don't want to be that guy. Okay. Okay. That's a valid answer. How would a parent who is wanting to enroll their child in magnesium or maybe sample it, see if it's a fit, if it has an impact on their confidence, behavior, grades? Is there like a sample platter for magnesium?

SPEAKER_00 23:19

How does all of that work? So I always encourage when we have someone come in for an assessment is that we do a trial session. So that's something that we almost always offer as part of that process. You know, the student gets a taste of what the center looks like and how it operates when they're there for the assessment, as do the parents. And so they're like, okay, well, what does that look like for my student? And I say, well, you know, we can always do a session to see what they think and see if it's going to be a good fit for them. And more times than not, that trial session I have found solidifies that for them. And ultimately, you know, the student is like, oh yeah, absolutely. I would, I would love to come here based upon that. And so it's something that I always almost always encourage is to just to give it a try if they, you know, are kind of on the fence about it, if they're, you know, raring to go as soon as they take their assessment, which we have a lot of students that are like that as well. They see all the rewards, they see the kids having fun at the tables with the instructors and all that. And they're like, yep, let's let's do this. But ultimately, it's something that I think is always a good idea for them to try. Yeah, I love that.

SPEAKER_02 24:26

And what about if a faculty member hears about, oh, math night and they want to they want to do that?

SPEAKER_01 24:32

What do they do? They can reach out to Cherie at the center and she'll help get them started. The other thing that we also try to do, just sort of to follow up a little bit on your last question. Sometimes kids enroll and it turns out that, you know, they come to three or four sessions and they decide that we really aren't quite the right fit for them. When we sign students up, they do sign up with a bit of a contract. If you let us know before the end of the first full month that we're not the right fit for you, we'll cancel the contract with no, with no penalties to them. So just let us know how things are going and we can we can work with with most situations so that nobody feels like they're trapped inside of something.

SPEAKER_02 25:09

Yeah. Thank you, ladies, so much for this. I am so excited that you are a part of the tools in the parental toolbox for academic confidence. I really appreciate it. We'll be linking everything in the show notes. And we look forward to seeing you at the next Palooza.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Thank you. Thank you for having us.

SPEAKER_02 25:27

Thanks for listening. Be sure to subscribe and share. Voices United in Education is a production of Escambia County Public Schools.