Learned Math Phobia: The impact on children of parents' and educators' attitude towards mathematics

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Learned Math Phobia The impact on children of
parents' and educators' attitude towards
mathematics

• William Devine, MA, LPC
• MathFour.com

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Math Anxiety - What is it?

• "Math anxiety is commonly defined as a feeling of
  tension, apprehension, or fear that interferes
  with math performance. (Ashcraft, 2002)
• Shown to have a significant positive correlation
  with academic and test anxiety

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DSM-V (proposed)

• Dyscalculia
• Difficulties in production or comprehension of
  quantities, numerical symbols, or basic
  arithmetic operations that are not consistent
  with the person's chronological age, educational
  opportunities, or intellectual abilities.
• significantly interferes with academic
  achievement or activities of daily living that
  require these numerical skills.

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Math Anxiety (contd)

• Negative impact
• Taxes working memory
• Acts as a secondary task
• Math aversive gt avoid math
• Fear of wrong answer gt decreased attempts gt
  learning is stalled
• Fewer upper level math classes taken
• In college, leads to the eventual limitation of
  job and career possibilities
• Cycle is perpetuated
• Mom, Dad, teachers pass it on

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Math Anxiety (contd)

• Negative Impact (contd)
• "To protect self-worth, students who are
  uncertain about their ability to achieve
  competitively may develop strategies that deflect
  attention from their ability. (Turner et. al.,
  2002)
• 'My body language said I cant do it, 'my hands
  sweat, 'I wanted to crawl under the desk, 'I
  felt frustrated, 'sometimes I just refused to
  attempt a new concept'. (Allen, 2010)

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Sources of Math Anxiety

• Fear of others reactions
• scolding (teacher)
• punishment or disappointment (parents)
• embarrassment (peers)
• Fear of failure
• making a mistake or doing it differently is NOT
  ok
• Pressure of performance
• Abilities seen as natural, not necessarily
  learnable
• Implication of poor aptitude
• Implication of inabilities

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Sources of Math Anxiety

• "A substantial portion of the adult population
  seems nervous or reluctant to pursue mathematical
  activity, often feeling that they will simply not
  be able to do it. (Stodolsky, 1985)

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Social and Interactive Influences

• Society - youre either good at math, or youre
  not.
• Parents - Go ask your father, I was never any
  good at that stuff.
• Teachers - No, Billy, thats not the way we do
  it.
• Math instruction dominantly assumes only one way
  to learn teacher presentation followed by
  practice. (Stodolsky, 1985)
• The student - Im trying really hard, why does
  she get mad at me?

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Far Reaching Impact

• "High levels appeared in remedial mathematics and
  declined with more advanced study. Mathematics
  and science majors were predictably low in the
  construct. The highest levels occurred for
  students preparing to teach in elementary
  school. (Hembree, 1990)
• This issue is of major concern to our economy,
  to a childs future employment and their success
  in higher education. Creating a country of
  mathophobes does not bode well for us in the
  uncertain global economy of the future. (Geist,
  2010)

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WHAT to Change

• Negative to Positive Influences
• Its ok to be wrong
• Talking about math early on
• Its all around us, not just in the classroom
• Expressing the positive
• Awareness of parent and teacher effects
• Promoting creativity and autonomy in childrens
  exploration of math
• "The words of the interviewees emphasized the
  fact that a caring teacher in a supportive
  environment who uses multiple teaching strategies
  to address the needs of all students is the best
  remedy for reducing math anxiety. (Tchibozo,
  2010)

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HOW to Change

• Bringing together knowledge and mainstream
  support
• Knowledge
• Of what to do informed by experience AND the
  research
• Support
• From those in positions to spread informed
  awareness
• Awareness
• To court AND inform the public

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How to Change (contd)

• Knowledge
• The use of experience AND research in informing
  the direction of improving numeracy
• Addressing math anxiety as a part of this
• Research on
• working memory
• scaffolding
• supportive learning environments
• In the school
• At home
• With other children
• motivation and autonomy
• its already there

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How to Change (contd)

• Awareness
• Numeracy campaign
• What would an effective one look like?
• Its already started kind of
• Talk of need for improvement in STEM
• (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics)
• How do we use the momentum of STEM movement to
  push a community-assisting agenda regarding math
  anxiety?

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Other Change Topics

• Training for teachers
• Instructional vs. Behavioral/motivational support
• Tap the motivation
• Use the momentum of the childs interest
• Help working memory
• Being able to increase, at virtually no cost,
  childrens ability to retain and manipulate
  information therefore offers promising prospects
  for application in education. (Autin, 2012)
• Offering truly instructional texts to teachers
• Supporting changes conducive to creating an
  environment where these things can happen.

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Works Cited

• Ashcraft, M. H., (2002). Math anxiety, personal,
  educational, cognitive consequences. Current
  Directions in Psychological Science, 11(5),
  181-185.
• Autin, F., Croizet, J.-C. (2012, March 5).
  Improving Working Memory Efficiency by Reframing
  Metacognitive Interpretation of Task Difficulty.
  Journal of Experimental Psychology General.
• Geist, E. (2010). The Anti-Anxiety Curriculum
  Combating Math Anxiety in the Classroom. Journal
  of Instructional Psychology, 37(1), 24-31.
• Hembree, R. (1990). The nature, effects, and
  relief of mathematics anxiety. Journal for
  Research in Mathematics Education, 21, 33-46.
• Stodolsky, S. S. (1985). Telling Math Origins of
  Math Aversion and Anxiety. Educational
  Psychologist, 20(3), 125-133.
• Tchibozo, G., ed. (2010), Proceedings of the 2nd
  Paris International Conference on Education,
  Economy and Society, Vol. 1, Strasbourg (France)
  Analytrics
• Turner, J.C., et.al. (2002). The Classroom
  Environment and Students Reports of Avoidance
  Strategies in Mathematics. Journal of Educational
  Psychology 94(1), 88-106.