Students with ADHD often find the symbolic language of math very challenging and can easily "lose their places" in problems and assignments that require multiple steps to solve. Today we'll offer a few tips that can ease some of that challenge and make math seem less daunting.
- Have Some Model Problems Worked Out and Use Them as Examples as the Student Works. Be explicit in delineating each step in the problem solving process by numbering them and consider using a different color for each step. Keep the worked out examples clearly visible and within reach.
- Create/use mnemonics for repeated procedures such as long division, e.g. “Dead Mice Smell Bad” (Divide, Multiply, Subtract, Bring Down) or the order of operations e.g. “Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally” (PEMDAS) to help them solve problems that have several operations.
- If an ADHD student can demonstrate mastery of the important concepts and skills that a problem is reinforcing by doing one or two of that kind of problem, there’s no reason to have him or her do every problem in an assignment or even multiple assignments that are simply reinforcing the same concepts, skills and level of complexity. Work with the teacher and the school to get this important accommodation.
- Follow These Steps for Word Problems . . .
- Identify key words such as “is” or “was” and remind the student that these are typically words that mean use an equal sign and that the words near these key words often contain the important facts of the problem.
- Identify the key facts and mark them with a colored pencil so they can be quickly recognized as the student works.
- Eliminate words that don’t give information but are there simply to complete grammar constructions.
- Consider Using Color to Distinguish Between Different Operation Symbols, i.e. + as blue , – as red, x as green, / as yellow.
- Correct Errors Immediately. Make sure that someone is checking each problem as it gets done initially. Don’t allow a student to do a whole problem set only to discover that the wrong procedure was used or that a consistent error is being made.
Next time we'll offer part 2 of these tips. Got any you'd like to share?
