As math education researchers, when we meet people on airplanes or at business events and tell them we support math teachers, people have two responses. First, they tell us how terrible their own math experience was. Second they respond with 'And, now, I can't even help my kid with math' because the ways we teach math have changed. MathParents is a response to both of these issues!
MathParents a website created to support parents to tie their own understanding of math to the math their children are being assigned in school (grades K-8). It is a collaborative project by Rethink Learning Inc. and Urso Education Consulting, two organizations focused on improving math teaching and learning through applying research to real-world problems.
MathParents has three core values.
- All people are math people. Everyone is capable of doing math and supporting their kids to learn it. All people are capable of thinking mathematically, but many people experience math as unapproachable. Negative experiences with math do not define you. You are capable of talking about math, helping others learn math, and learning together. We are here to help you.
- It is time to end math trauma. Too many people have been traumatized by their own math experiences. We want children to thrive. But for some people, math trauma may be generational. An adult who suffers from math anxiety is likely to pass that on to their child. We want to help everyone learn to have fun with math.
- Developing a productive disposition is an important part of learning math. Sometimes, math is hard - and that's completely okay. Digging in and working through problems is how real learning happens. It's okay to admit that math isn't easy. Most things worth doing aren't easy. Math is part of our world and our lives, and it's okay to take your time to understand it.
So how does MathParents plan on helping parents and guardians?
We are developing several resources: step-by-step homework explainers in both video and written form, blog posts about how math learning can be integrated into real life - among other topics, 24/7 access to a discussion board visited daily by the developers of the site, and live Q&A sessions where participants can ask the math education experts behind MathParents for help.
Your support is directly invested into the MathParents resources. We are actively developing the website and resources with plans to pilot it with parents in the near future. We will be sharing updates on the site including what we are developing, how our pilots are going, and where MathParents is making a difference.
