How to be Confident at Maths

‘I was never any good at Maths’ is a cry I heard at parents’ evening, which made me weep inside. The experiences we have growing up affect us for the rest of our lives. If this is you, it isn’t that you are no good at maths, I believe everyone can do maths – it’s just that you haven’t had an education that matches you and the way that you learn. 

Here are five of my top tips to improve your confidence with maths:

Tip 1: Acknowledge the maths you do

There will be areas in life where you do maths and it’s important that you acknowledge how well you are doing with it.

There’s so many areas of life where you do maths, from baking, doing your accounts and budgeting, in your daily work, through to DIY and shopping. It may not feel like much but you’d be surprised how much you do, and how good you are!

Tip 2: Understand your different learning styles

I talk about this for our young people but what about ourselves? The way that we learn is so important and will explain why you haven’t been confident with maths. Once you know your learning styles you will be able to find the correct methods that work for you. For example, as a visual learner you can use methods which are more visual.

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Tip 3: Have a growth mindset

Remember that getting it wrong is the first step in learning. The most important thing is your mindset and how you learn from your mistakes. Have a look at some of my blog posts on this.

Tip 4: Learn different methods

Have you ever moaned that you don’t understand the methods that are taught at school? Yes, maths looks different, but if you embrace the different methods and learn them using your learning preferences from sources such as YouTube, you will find that some of them suit you much better.

Tip 5: Reframe your language

It’s important that you stop saying that you can’t do Maths, it stops you from moving forward with it, and it’s not good for your young person to hear this. You can reframe it to ‘I didn’t have the right education, but I’m working on it now’. 

To see how confident you are with maths try this quiz, the National Numeracy Challenge.