Emotional Wellness for Math

January marks the fifth month of this school year. What are your child’s thoughts about their grade-level math so far? Now is a good time to check with your child about their outlook towards math with fresh eyes and make necessary adjustments.

Math can allow parents with the opportunity to build emotional-learning skills for their children, that includes recognizing and managing their emotions, identifying sources of stress, handling challenges, maintaining enthusiasm and perseverance, and developing self-awareness. Children require emotional guidance as they are growing up, and you can help your child manage their emotions when math seems too difficult, too boring, or even too easy. If angst and fear has been a regular part of your child’s math discussions, think about how you can bring about a change in that in 2023. Inspiring or even maintaining a love of math will mean incorporating a healthy mix of challenges. Consider some of these strategies to ensure the emotional wellness of math:

1. If math has often been hard and challenging, help your child finding out one good thing about their math experience so far. With every difficulty, there is growth.
2. Incorporate a “feelings chart” or “feelings thermometer” into your child’s math work. A feelings chart is simply a chart or wheel that labels different feelings or emotions.
3. Allow your child to sit with their emotions and to reach out for support.
4. Relieve stress through physical activities, including physical math walks
5. Reframe negative thoughts about math by making a pros and cons list of the facts.
6. Inspire self-compassion by helping your child acknowledge when they have worked hard, tried their best, and been brave.
7. Register your child for a math competition.

Remember that strong emotional-learning skills will lead to successful academic performance in all subject areas and will build a healthy member of society.