I am sure many parents are able relate the agony of careless mistakes with me. This is particularly common in young boys. They tend to be more careless and more resistant to change in this aspect.
In my tuition class, I share 5 strategies with my students to eliminate careless mistakes in Mathematics.
1. Write neatly and write big numbers
This is the most important strategy. First of all, it aids in the checking. If the child writes neatly, it is very easy for him to check his work.
Secondly, it eliminates the ambiguity of certain numbers. Can you imagine the teacher has a stack of exam papers to mark and still has to waste time guessing wheither a number is a '0', a '6' or a '9'.
You have to remind your child to write neatly at all times.
2. Time management
Time management in an exam paper will help the child to pace himself properly. How much time should be spent on each question?
The key phrase here is 'Don't linger. Don't dash." for each question. If you get stuck, move on to the next question. Do not waste too much time on one question.
It is also important to remind the child not to be affected by his peers during examination. When a child sees his friends putting their heads on the table to rest, he will be tempted to do so too.
This is a type of peer pressure. It is a very misguided thinking that 'I am faster than you and therefore I am smarter than you'.
Highlight to your child that it is the marks that matters.
3. Test the answers
This is something that I practise often in my tuition lessons. After the student gets the answer, plug answer back into the question to see if it fits.
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Ali and Ben have 30 apples. Ali has 20 apples. How many apples does Ben have?
30 - 20 = 10
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To test the answer, put the 10 back into the question. If Ali has 20 apples and Ben has 10 apples, they will have 30 apples altogether. This confirms that the answer is correct as the first sentence states that Ali and Ben have 30 apples.
Although this is a very simple strategy, it is not commonly taught in schools and hence it is not commonly practised also. You must practise this with your child. It is a very simple and yet very effective checking tool.
4. Watch out for transfer error
I see this very often in some students' work. When the question requires two steps, the answer from the first step is transferred wrongly to the second step. Take a look at the following example.
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Ali and Ben have 30 apples. Ali has 20 apples.
(a) How many apples does Ben have?
(b) How many more apples does Ali have than Ben?
(a) 30 - 20 = 10
(b) 20 - 16 = 4
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You can see that the student transferred 10 wrongly. It was written as 16 in the second step. Marks were lost for nothing.
To help your child in this, go back to Step 1: Write neatly. This will minimise your child from copying wrongly.
Another way is to teach your child to scan for all the transfers before handing up the paper.
5. Practise and practise and practise
Careless mistakes have something to do with accuracy. Ultimately, it is the lack of practice that contributes to careless mistakes. If your child practise enough, how can he get 1 + 1 = 2 wrong?
Help your child to practise addition and subtraction regularly. Test his multiplication tables often.
The key is to help the child practise enough so that they can create the habit and make it stick.
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Holidays are just around the corner! Do you have a plan to bridge all the learning gaps of your child?
I recommend you to have a holiday revision program with your child. Rather than watching television programs or playing games everyday, it will give some structure and aim to his holidays.
There are 5 steps in coming up with a holiday program.
Step 1: Set a goal with the child
This is the most important step. Without the commitment of the child, it is almost pointless to do a holiday revision program. The way to start this discussion is to discuss the recent exam results with the child.
The two key questions to the child here is "How are you going to improve on your grades?" and "What are you going to give up for this improvement?".
Get the child's commitment and get him write it down on a Post-It note. Some examples might be:
"I will put in my best efforts to learn for 30 minutes a day for 20 days."
"I will complete a past year paper everyday for the next 10 days."
Paste it somewhere where the child will see everyday. Get your child to read it to himself everyday. Remember, you want the child to take over the ownership of this revision program.
Step 2: Teaching
The second step is to design the learning for the child. What type of gaps are you bridging? How are you going to teach the child? Some tools might be:
- textbooks
- guidebooks
- videos
- experiments (for Science)
- mini-projects
- mindmaps
- presentation slides
Do not skip this part. This is the visible input that your child will see from you. This is the portion that makes the holiday program a joint effort rather than an edict by a parent.
The key here is to have fun learning with your child.
Step 3: Deliberate Practice
After learning, we have to practice. For more information on deliberate practice, you can read my blog post at http://mrdannylim.blogspot.sg/2014/09/secret-art-deliberate-practice.html.
Some forms of practice are
- worksheets/assessment books/past-year papers
- online educational games
- process writing
- documenting an experiment (for Science)
Tell the child upfront that this is not going to be easy and it creates a chance to learn the character trait 'perseverance'.
Encourage your child often that he is doing well and he is putting in effort. Some children require more encouragement at this stage.
Please don't praise your child. 'Well done!' and 'Excellent' mean very little to children.
Encourage them.
'You are almost there!'
'I can see that you are putting on your thinking hat here.'
'A lot of effort today. Giving up now means wasting all the effort you have put in. Come on! You can do it! Strive on!'
Be vigilant here. If the worksheet is too difficult for the child, the child will give up. Incremental difficulty is the key here. Read my blog post on deliberate practice for more information.
Step 4: Testing
Set a way to test your child after the revision program. It should be like a mini-test with marks. This is to measure the result of the program and to provide concrete feedback on how the child is doing.
Some ideas might be:
- past-year paper
- a writing test
Whether your child has done well or not, praise him on his effort. This is positive reinforcement and will set the pace for the next revision program.
Step 5: Reflection
At the end of the program, have a reflection discussion with your child to analyse it. Some questions might be:
- Did we get the results we wanted?
- What went wrong?
- What were the right things that we did?
- Was the length of study too long?
- Was the environment distracting?
- Were the worksheets too difficult?
If you want to guide the child to have a consistent study program during normal school days, ask the following questions:
- Was this revision program useful?
- Do we need to do this only during the holidays?
- Shall we have a plan for 'keeping up' rather than 'catching up'?
Explicitly tell your child that learning can be fun, but deliberate practice to level up can be hard work sometimes.
I will say this again. The success of the revision program hinges on the level of commitment you can get from the child in Step 1.
This incremental improvement can be addictive. If you can get your child to do this consistently, it will become a habit to him and self-regulated learning can be very near!
Have fun learning and enjoy your holidays!
I hope this post has been helpful to you. Please click on SHARE on Facebook to share this post with your friends.
(Sign up for my newsletter at http://eepurl.com/WDj6j for monthly tips on how to motivate your child to study. A free ebook on writing is included in the newsletter.)
