Math is one of the trickiest subjects for a lot of children. And even though there’s a stereotype that autistic children are good at it (and some are), they can struggle with it too. As with any other subject, practice often makes perfect. Spending time working on important skills can help your child flex their math skills and get a better grasp on numeracy. The great thing about learning at home is that you also have the flexibility to learn in different ways. You can find different methods for learning key numeracy skills, making math fun, and applying math to real-world scenarios too.
Playing games and doing a range of activities can make math more engaging. So many activities are easy to set up too, and they can be suitable for a range of ages.
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Complete Some Puzzles
Puzzles and games are fun options to help make numeracy more interesting. There are various types of puzzles you can try out with your child. Some of them are great for them to try alone and others are good for you to do together. Try out a sudoku for a logic puzzle that can prove to be a head-scratcher. They come in different levels of difficulty, so they can be suitable for a range of skill levels and ages. A connect-the-dots picture can be a great way to practice number recognition while a domino puzzle board could be used to practice addition.
Do Some Baking
If you’re looking for ways to implement math skills in the real world, baking can be an excellent choice. It involves measurements and weights and can sometimes require some multiplication, division, addition, or subtraction. You can also use baking to learn about fractions and proportions, and even ratios. Whether you choose to use a set of scales of measure using cups and spoons, you could talk about how much of each ingredient you might need if you divide the recipe in two or how many cookies each person would get if you shared them among four people.
Go Shopping
Shopping is another fun option if you’re looking for a real-world scenario to practice numeracy and math. And the great thing is, you don’t even actually have to go shopping. While you could choose to go to the store if you want to (or need to), you can also set up a role-playing shopping trip at home. Use toys, items from around the house, or even print-outs of items to “sell”. You can even make your own money. This activity can give children the chance to practice addition and subtraction, as well as rounding up.
Count with Candy
Playing with candy might not be something you want to make a habit of, but it does make a fun game that’s perfect for learning numeracy. When you have individual pieces of candy, you can use them for counting, addition and subtraction, multiplication and division, and fractions. You can move the pieces around into different groups, using them to count and provide a visual way to demonstrate a range of concepts. And when you’re done, you can divide up the pieces between you and others in the family so everyone gets some candy and you squeeze in one last lesson on fractions.
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Magical Math Stories
If your child loves to engage in stories and all things fiction, you can use it to explore the math skills they need to learn. There are fun math books out there, which you could buy if you want a shortcut. But if you want to be a bit more creative, you could make up a story. This allows you to incorporate some math elements that will be most useful for your child, focusing on the skills they need to improve or the subject you’re currently working on. You can add math questions into the story, even turning it into a “choose your own adventure” story so your child gets to influence what happens.
Fun with Dice and Dominoes
Both dice and dominoes are great tools for practicing skills like adding up and multiplication. You can roll some dice or lay out some dominoes and ask your child to add the numbers together. You could get them to round up the numbers to the nearest 10, then add these numbers together or multiple different combinations. The dice or dominoes add a game element to some simple numeracy skills, making it more exciting and less like classwork. You could make things more difficult by bringing in more dice or dominoes and introducing more numbers to play with.
Play Some Board Games
Plenty of board games are good for practicing numeracy skills. A simple game like chutes and ladders, for example, can help children practice counting up and down the board. You can even make board games super-sized so you can play them outdoors. You could use paper plates to make numbered “squares” on a board, or maybe draw a board with some chalk. You could then use some dice to roll numbers and play games that involve addition, multiplication, or whatever else makes sense for your child’s learning goals.
Hopscotch Multiplication Tables
If you have chalk, another use for it is drawing a hopscotch set up outdoors. You can use the hopscotch to practice multiplication by putting a sum or multiple in each square. As your child hops and skips along, they’ll have to answer questions or simply add up the multiples to help them learn their multiplications. You can adapt this game for different purposes too. For younger children, it could simply have a sequence of numbers in each square to help them practice their counting. This is a fun game to play with friends too, although it’s just as good to play alone.
