There are 5 steps to problem solving, and these steps can be taught to younger children and students with special learning needs. Therefore, these steps can be applied to statistics lessons in the foundational level as well as more advanced levels. They can built upon, and used with greater independence as your student progresses through their education journey.
The early learning concepts that students should understand before moving on to more advanced, formal maths are known as foundational maths. Because the pace of the curriculum is so fast, students with special learning needs are particularly vulnerable to failing to retain and comprehend the fundamentals. The fundamentals of mathematics serve as the foundations for more complex ideas.
Foundational statistics work should involve solving problems by matching, sorting, categorising, and organising objects and data. Students should be taught to problem solve through:
- Recognising and identifying issues;
- Breaking problems down and planning how to solve them;
- Remembering ways to solve a problem and carrying them out; and
- Evaluating how a plan worked and recognising when plans need to be altered.
Work through all of these 5 steps to give your child or student practice with posing problems, collecting and handling data and solving questions. This will give them a good starting point for data handling and statistics work in the future. In addition, work on these early number concepts, these early geometry concepts, these early measurement concepts and use these online maths manipulatives to ensure that your student has a strong foundation in all maths strands.
Want to make sure your child or student is getting the right support? Would you like someone to accurately pinpoint where the difficulties lie in your child and the steps needed to address them? We offer targeted one-to-one maths tuition. All sessions are delivered by Kristy, a maths specialist.
What has been your child or student’s experience with problem solving? Comment below or on our facebook page. We’d love to hear from you.