A 7-Year Old can Learn to Love Math!
Posted on April 04, 2011 by Nannette DiMascio, One of Thousands of Leadership Coaches on Noomii.
Learning "disabilities" are usually more of a teaching challenge than the child's difficulty.
I worked with a delightful 7-year old today. Let’s just call her “C,” as she is a celebrity in my eyes. From our work together she went from scoring 90% to 100% on her spelling tests.
Today she showed me a math test where she got a “D.” This made me think…she is very bright, she knows the math, it is addition. One digit, simple addition. I made a copy of the test, she completed it in the time frame that the teacher alloted. She got 100%. I did it again, but scrambled the 20 or so addition problems. Again, 100%. I asked her, “What is the difference between these two tests.” She said, “One I got a D, the other an A.”
I noted, “Ok, they are the same test, you had the same amount of time. How did you feel when you took the D test?” She replied, “Scared.” Me, “How about the A test?” She replied, “I felt relaxed.”
I then elicited her strategy for taking the math test at school. It was the following:
1. It is afternoon time, they are reading
2. The teacher says “I will now pass out your papers.”
3. C then says to herself, “I will get a D.”
4. She then creates feelings of being scared and “shakes” a little.
I asked her how she feels when she gets an A on the spelling test.
She did a little dance. It was really cute. We did the “A” dance together.
I future paced her using her strategy.
“When you are at school on Tuesday and your teacher is passing out the papers…”
Then installed a revised strategy:
1. Say to yourself “I will get an A.” We danced around and did the “A” dance to anchor it.
2. To help her feel relaxed I showed her how to do the Hakalau technique (See the video at the bottom of http://www.homeofnlp.com). With her I call it the “Meow” technique. We make a “meow” sound when we open to peripheral vision to make it fun.
Note: She started to get 100% on her tests!
