Looking Ahead: Insights from Middle School for Parents of Young Children (Part 2)
Apr 09, 2025Welcome back! This is a continuation of my last post, where I shared the first four key takeaways from a recent middle school math conference that directly connect to how we should be thinking about raising math-confident children in early childhood. If you missed it, you can find it as a blog post HERE.
Here, I'm sharing the final insights—each of which emphasizes how we can nurture flexible thinking, curiosity, and confidence in our kids, long before they reach middle school.
- Learning math means understanding different ways of solving problems
During my own presentation at the conference, I got to share with 75 educators about the work of my former 7th graders during a series of lessons that guided them to examine different ways of thinking about adding positive and negative numbers. I gave students a set of expressions like 3 + (-5) and asked them to make a model to show what was happening. Some drew number lines, others used stories about owing and earning money, and some created different kinds of physical models and interesting drawings. Different students said different models made the most sense to them, which allowed a range of students to understand the concept of adding positives and negatives - the first step to building fluency with this skill.
The same principle applies to our youngest learners. When we value their approach and ask them if they can think of any additional ways to figure something out, we reinforce that math is about thinking, not just getting the “right” answer.
- Understanding different ways of solving problems deepens learning.
While not every group of my 7th graders generated more than one strategy on their own, I intentionally built in time for them to analyze and reflect on their classmates’ work. A slightly different angle on idea #5, this process—of examining someone else’s thinking and asking, “What does this show me that my way didn’t?”—helped illuminate new elements of the mathematics we were studying and sparked powerful discussions.
We can engage our young children in similar conversations. If your child finds a way to count or solve a problem that looks different from how you would do it, resist the urge to correct them - especially if it doesn’t immediately make sense to you. Instead, ask, “How did you figure that out?” or “Tell me about your thinking.”
If your child sees a friend count on fingers while they count in their head, talk about how both strategies work - and reasons one might be a better choice in the situation. Analyzing when a strategy makes sense to use is a mathematical practice that teachers across K-12 are tasked with developing.
- Asking good questions is fundamental to guiding math learning.
Many people think that being a good teacher means explaining things clearly. I believe that it’s actually more about asking really good questions. Questions are what prompt thinking! One conference session showed us how to take run-of-the-mill textbook problems and reformat them as a series of curiosity-provoking questions.
Our young children are often the first ones to ask a curious question - when they do, pick up the conversation with a question of your own! Here’s an example:
“Mommy, which has more, the Teddy Grahams or the Cheez-Its?”
“How could we figure that out?”
“I don’t know.”
“Is there a way you can figure out how many Teddy Grahams there are first?”
You get the picture!
- Listening to children’s ideas and thinking deepens adults’ math understanding.
As adults, we often forget what it’s like to learn something for the first time - we are just so far away from our initial learning about numbers! Listening to how children reason can help us gain new insights into mathematics - one of the big takeaways I shared at the MidSchoolMath conference was how much I learned about the math content by trying to make sense of what my students were producing. Plus, when kids feel heard and valued in their thinking, they are more likely to stay engaged and confident.
One More Thought: Math Anxiety Affects High Achievers Too.
The conference session on this topic stuck with me, and reminded me of Sarah, whose daughter I wrote about a couple of weeks ago. It drives home for me that mindsets are at least as equally important as skills when it comes to math learning. We want our children to be successful in their math education journey, but if they develop an expectation of perfection or understanding things immediately their sense of confidence will crumble at whatever point things get hard. We need to normalize struggle as a step toward growth, and engrain this picture in our children’s brains!
Take Action
This week, look for an opportunity to ask your child, “How did you figure that out?” and really listen to their answer. Not only will this support their math learning, but it might also change the way you think about math yourself! What math moments have you noticed in your daily life?
