Improving Maths Skills Using Precision Teaching

Difficulties with Maths

Children who do well in maths at school tend to have two distinct sets of skills.

• Firstly, they have good “basic” skills. This means that they are able to use a range of strategies to add, subtract, multiply and divide. They tend to be able to use both mental strategies and written methods. Importantly, the skills of children who do well in maths are fluent. This means that, not only are they able to arrive at answers, they are able to do so quickly and seemingly without too much effort.
• Secondly, they are able to apply their basic maths skills (described above) to solve problems. Take a problem such as:

How many boxes of 6 eggs will be needed to feed 12 people if everyone has two eggs each?

Children with good skills in this area are able to sort in their heads, what information will help them solve the problem and what kind of sum (or sums) they will need to do in order to get the answer.

Children can have difficulty in either or both of these areas. Often children have good basic skills but find the problem solving element difficult. Other children are effective problem-solvers but find it very difficult to memorise times tables’ facts and basic addition and subtraction facts for example and often make mistakes. Even when these children are able to achieve the correct answer, it can take them a long time to do so and this puts extra pressure on them when completing all aspects of maths.

Both areas are important. Problems with basic skills make other aspects of maths difficult, stressful and extremely time-consuming. Difficulties with solving problems means maths becomes frustrating and kids can perceive that maths is pointless.

Precision Teaching is a straightforward strategy that can be used at home or in school to improve the basic skills aspect of a young persons’ maths ability.

Precision Teaching: The Method

1. Identify an area where your child’s skills are beginning to develop but where they still need a bit of work to improve / sharpen their skills. For example, pick an area where they are still making a few mistakes or a skill where they may eventually get the right answer but it takes them a long time to do so.
   Choosing this carefully is important because if you pick something that is totally new or they find far too difficult, this exercise can become frustrating.
   When picking a skill to focus on, you might want to just focus on one area (e.g. only addition or only subtraction) or you may want to mix up the types of sums. You may also want to play about with the difficulty of the sums. For some children, giving them sums where they have to add numbers where the answer is no greater than 5 might be enough (e.g. 3 + 1 = ?; 2 + 2 = ?). For older children, the target might be to add / subtract two digit numbers (e.g. 19 + 22 = ?; 37 – 14 = ?)
2. Prepare a worksheet. It can have between 20 and 50 sums on it again this depends on the age of the child. If the target was to improve adding and subtracting within 20, the worksheet might look something like this.

• 12 + 3 =
• 16 – 4 =
• 7 + 4 =
• 17 – 8 =
• 2 + 7 =
• 13 + 4 =
• 2 + 9 =
• 8 + 9 =
• 9 – 4 =
• 8 + 7 =
• 2 + __ = 6
• 10 – 8 =
• 9 + 6 =
• 12 – 4 =
• 8 – __ = 3
• 12 – 7 =
• 5 – 4 =
• 9 + 9 =
• 14 – 6 =
• 9 + __ = 15
• 14 – 5 =
• 7 – 6 =
• 13 – 4 =
• 3 + 12 =
• 3 + 7 =
• 7 + 7 =
• 18 – 5 =
• 15 – __ = 8
• 6 + 7 =
• 8 + 3 =
• 14 + 4 =
• 17 – 9 =
• 11 – 6 =
• 17 – 2 =
• 13 – 7 =
• 2 + 14 =
• 20 – 5 =
• 16 – 9 =
• 6 + 12 =
• 12 – 9 =

1. Give this same worksheet to your child 3 to 4 times per week.
2. This is a timed exercise. Each time they complete the sheet, record how many they get correct in, say, five minutes. This time can vary. This figure could be between two and five minutes.
3. Each day, record the scores on an attractive table or a graph so that your child can see the improvements they are making. This is very important if they are to stay motivated.
4. Once they get most sums correct (e.g. 18 out of 20 or 35 out of 40) correct 2 days in a row and within the timescale you have set, you can give them a new sheet. This can be on the same skill or it can be on a new, slightly more complicated skill.

The targets and timescales described will vary depending on the age / ability of the young person. You can increase or reduce the time given, give more or less sums or increase or reduce the number you expect them to get correct. Don’t be scared to play about with the figures. This precision teaching technique is designed to be a challenge and improve their skills but if the targets set are too difficult, the exercise will become pointless.

You can check to see if a sheet is too easy or too difficult by monitoring their scores over a short period of time. If there is no improvement in scores during the first week or so, this suggests that the sheets are too difficult so you might want to make them a little easier. You might also decide that your child is doing well but the timescales are too tight. In these cases, you might give them more time or give them less sums on the sheet.