Partnering with parents - how to talk about mathematics with Dr Sarah Buckley

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Ben Allen:

My name's Ben Allen, and I'm one of the mathematics master teachers here at the Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership, and I'm here today with Sarah Buckley, who's a senior research fellow from the Australian Council for Educational Research, and she gets to lead the Maths Anxiety and Engagement Strategy, or MAES. In today's episode, we're going to be talking about positive maths talk. So before we begin, Sarah, can you tell us, or please share with us, what is Maths Anxiety Engagement Strategy, or MAES?

Sarah Buckley:

Thanks, Ben. It's lovely to talk to you today. MAES, that's what we call it, the Maths Anxiety Engagement Strategy, is something that we started at ACER in 2018 to address what we were seeing nationally, which was a widespread decline in student achievement and participation. So to address this decline, what we wanted to do was try and remove key barriers to students developing a positive relationship with maths so that they could learn and achieve and participate in the subject area. I should probably pause there and say, when we're saying we want to encourage students to develop a positive relationship with maths, we're not saying that they need to love it as their absolute favorite subject, but they need to understand that it's useful and valuable for their lives.

So in MAES, what we are trying to do is remove those key barriers, and we've identified two to focus on, maths anxiety and poor valuing of maths, and we're using research from education, psychology, neuroscience to understand how these barriers impact on learning, how we can address them using evidence-informed strategies, and then translate this so that it has impact in the classroom.

So we are working with schools and education stakeholders, government departments, universities saying, here's this research. Some of it is ACER’s research, some of it is just research that we've identified as being best practice. So what can we do to work with you, the person at the coalface, to translate this into a concrete tool of strategy that you can use to encourage that positive relationship with maths? And I should say one of the other things that we are trying to do in MAES because we recognize its importance is identify key ways that educators can partner with parents.

Ben Allen:

It's fantastic to hear that too, particularly that link around the decline, mathematical achievement and participation in general, and then thinking about what are those things that can be put in place for educators to really help in the classrooms, and also that link between parents at home as well. Can you tell us a little bit more about positive maths talk?

Sarah Buckley:

Yeah, so positive maths talk is basically what we would think about. It's talking about maths positively and parents have a really important role in this space. And so the work that we are doing in MAES and the work that we've been in partnership doing with the academy is trying to, one, emphasize the importance of educators partnering with parents because parents have such an influence on their children. Then when we're talking about that partnership, educators, schools, and all of us need to help parents so that they can understand, one, how important maths is for opening so many pathways for their children, and to empower parents to see themselves as having a crucial role in making sure that they are developing their child to be a resilient maths learner.

Ben Allen:

So Sarah, you just spoke about empowering parents when you were talking about positive maths talk. Can you tell us a little bit more about what that actually looks like? Because noticed even teaching that, sometimes things come back to school around the way parents have spoken about mathematics. So I'd love to hear what does it actually look like?

Sarah Buckley:

So it's just... As I said before, it's talking about maths in a positive light. And one of the first ways that we can recognize whether or not we're doing that is reflecting on the way that the language that we use in the home when we talk about maths versus the way we talk about other subjects. And if we think about that and compare that, it can highlight any differences that we might unconsciously have when we talk about maths. So for instance, one beautiful example of positive math talk is just that idea that anyone can learn and get better at maths if they put effort in. That's just a really key example of a way to talk about maths positively. If a lot of us reflect on the way that we talk about maths, we might find that we don't necessarily use that type of language when it comes to maths. We might use it in relation to other subject areas, but maybe not in relation to maths.

Ben Allen:

So clearly from what you've just said too, that self-reflection at home's really important to think about how we are framing up the talking of mathematics. Why do you see this so important? Why is it important to talk about positive maths talk?

Sarah Buckley:

Yeah, so we know that the home environment has a really important role in shaping students' attitudes, disposition towards maths, and that positive maths talk helps foster those positive attitudes and that positive relationship that we know is so crucial for maths learning. One of the biggest things that parents can do is to help provide an environment for their children that allows them to develop a growth mindset when it comes to maths. Now, a lot of educators will know what that is, but a growth mindset essentially is related to that positive math talk example that I gave before, the idea that anyone you can learn and get better at maths if they put effort in that doesn't mean that everyone's going to be a mathematician, but it just means that if you put effort in to your maths learning, you can improve.

Whereas the opposite of growth mindset is a fixed mindset, the idea that your maths potential and ability is really fixed, it's determined by your gender, it's determined by your genetics, all of those types of things. A lot of the teachers that I work with, and I'm sure you yourself, Ben, know that they will have spoken to a parent that will have said, "I wasn't very good at maths, and so that's why they're not very good at maths." Now, I think often when I talk to teachers about this because this is such a common experience that they've had, it's important to recognize that that parent probably didn't have a really good experience with maths previously and probably wants to shield their child from that type of negative experience, so he's saying that as a way for their child to feel comfortable with any kind of discomfort or anxiety that they might be feeling. But the reality is that's probably limiting the type of potential that their child thinks that they have in math.

So we want to try and get parents to reflect on if that's the way they're talking about math, that's not the type of attitude that we want to be encouraging. We want anyone to think that they can get better. We want maths to become accessible thing that anyone can be involved in, irrespective of their gender, race, culture, or their previous experience with maths.

Ben Allen:

So with those categories you've just spoken about, along with anyone can learn and get better at maths, the growth mindset, is there a bit of power here where talking positively about maths could potentially shift some myths around the learning of mathematics and what might be able to be dispelled?

Sarah Buckley:

Yes, and I think that's a really good question because I think if we want to encourage positive maths talk a way to do that is also to make sure that we get rid of any myths that are out there. And there are so many that really encourage a fixed mindset to grow in children. So the myths, I think I mentioned a couple of them, so that girls are not as good at maths as boys, that you're either a maths person or you're not. You might be a maths person or you're an English person, that there's no creativity in maths, that struggling is bad, that you need to be able to know the answer straight away. And if you don't, you're just naturally not very good at maths. That's one that is quite prevalent, and that could stop students from putting their hand up and asking a question.

We know that all of these things are completely false, and we need to dismantle them because they encourage a really black and white thinking when it comes to maths, an either or, which really sets things up for students to develop a fixed mindset. So for instance, if you believe that gender myth, that girls are just not wired to do well in maths, and if you identify as a girl, then you are going to believe that your gender determines your ability and your potential. And so there's not much you can do about it, when actually research says that's not the case. So we want to get rid of those types of things.

Ben Allen:

So what does the research say about student outcomes in relevance to positive maths talk?

Sarah Buckley:

So the research says that children's attitudes towards maths can be shaped by parents. So for instance, there was a lot of research that emphasized mother's beliefs as being really important for helping shape the way that students viewed maths. There's also been research looking at the impact of parents in terms of maths anxiety. So one study in the US found that maths anxious grade one and grade two students were tended to not perform or learn as well over a year, only if their maths anxious parents helped them with their homework. So I'll put a little pause in there and say that doesn't mean we want parents maths anxious parents not helping their children with their homework, but it sort of just makes us think how are they helping and do they need help to be able to scaffold their kids in a way that's more positive?

But there was also some more recent research in Chile, which is a little bit more contradictory, which I find always fascinating. And this research sort of identified maths anxious parents that had maths anxious children, and it found that when those maths anxious parents did more maths activities in the home, their children's maths anxiety didn't really impact on their learning. And so the authors of this study concluded that maths anxious parents might be really good at supporting the learning that their children are doing in the home because they have empathy for the experience. They understand what it's like to struggle and to feel negative emotion when it comes to maths, whereas non maths anxious parents might not be as experienced at how debilitating things like maths anxiety can be, and they might not know the best way to support their children.

So even though these findings are a little bit contradictory, I think the important thing to highlight here is that they're suggesting that maybe different types of parents need different types of support and that helping parents see what positive maths talk looks like and how we can help talk about and encourage things like a growth mindset are really important, and also that people that are confident in maths still need support on how to help those that are less confident or anxious. Some of the work that we do in MAES is with pre-service teachers, and we have found that pre-service teachers who are highly confident at maths, when we talk to them about this is working with them about maths anxiety, they often have never understood how problematic can be and how it can cause people to steer away from maths because they haven't had that experience. And so just learning about how it can really be such a negative experience to feel those emotions gives them more empathy, and then they're able to then think about how they support those students a bit better.

Ben Allen:

The experience piece there, either having experienced maths anxiety or not from parents, and even pre-service teachers from the research you've just spoken about and the base frameworks, it's really interesting to think about the implications that has for students in the classroom and thinking about how we talk about mathematics in general. And just on that note with MAES, the resource that's been developed with the academy, Sarah, on why maths-

Sarah Buckley:

Yes.

Ben Allen:

... I'd love you to talk about that. Thinking about, what is the actual resource?

Sarah Buckley:

Yeah, sure. It's building on some other research that I didn't mention before, but that I'll talk about now, that has sort of shown that if you send home... Well, this was a study that was done in the US where they sent home brochures to parents, which told them why maths is important and shared some tips about how to talk about maths positively in the home. They later saw greater enrollment in math subjects. So really emphasizing that idea that parents do have that crucial role role. And this study was with adolescent students, so secondary students, the resource that you mentioned called Why Maths, which has been developed in the lovely partnership that we've had between the academy and ACER, is picking up on this research. It is targeting secondary students and secondary students parents. But a lot of the themes that are talked about in there are still relevant for the primary space.

It's just that the language in there is more for secondary. The resource itself has two parts, but its intention is that it could be sent home to parents, so either as a hard copy or as a soft copy. I'm always accessing Compass for my daughters. I'm always getting things sent on Compass, so it could easily be put on there too. So the two parts of the resource resources, firstly, it just is really highlighting where maths is in our everyday lives. So just bringing it up so that we're aware of how useful it is. It's also talking about why maths is important for their children's future opportunities and highlights, oh, did you know that all of these different jobs require math skills? Because one of the things that we find is that people are really aware that it's in things like engineering, but they don't know that all these other jobs, like being a retail buyer for instance, requires you to have really established maths skills as well.

So it has that part. So where is maths in our everyday life? And how is it really useful for your children to keep doing maths? And then it has some pointers for parents to reflect on how they're talking about maths in the home and just emphasizes, here are some things that you could be doing and talking about to really help foster that positive relationship with maths in your child.

Ben Allen:

So it's great hearing about the partnerships with parents and thinking about how they're talking or potentially using this resource at home, Sarah, and I love hearing that too because I think about the partnership schools already have with parents. And so many parents are really trying their best at home to do the right thing by their child, talk about maths in the right way, and this resource sounds like a really great way of just checking in with making sure that they're on the right page or they are talking about it in a positive light. But how is this resource different to other resources that may already exist?

Sarah Buckley:

There is a lot out there that talks about how you can talk positively about maths and make sure that you are doing things that are encouraging that growth mindset. I think one of the key things that we emphasize in this resource is that parents don't need to know the answer to the math that their kids are doing in order to have a positive impact on their kids' learning. And I think that might be where a lot of parents feel stuck. Their children are progressing through school, and they're like, "I can't do the maths anymore." That doesn't mean that your positive influence stops, because it's so important that parents still support their children by saying, "Oh look, I don't know the answer, but who can we ask for help?" That's so important. There's nothing wrong with not knowing the answer, but a parent needs to be able to say, "Oh, well we can find it out," or "You can work on this and get better." And I think that's really important. So we're not expecting parents to have to do the maths with their children.

They can if they want to, but they don't need to still have that positive impact, and that's what we're really emphasizing in the resource.

Ben Allen:

And I think that comes back to that modeling, doesn't it? You're modeling a positive mindset, a growth mindset, positive maths talk, explaining to your children, it's okay I don't know the answer, because I think there's an element of that too, that it's okay not to know the answer exactly, but the strategies to where to look or what the next step might be. And this is such a great resource to do, it gives those tips.

Sarah Buckley:

Yes. Because I think what we often see is if a student has a fixed mindset, if a parent has a fixed mindset about maths, once they hit a barrier and they don't know the answer, they just stop, and they won't ask for help. They won't try and work another way up because they think that they can't move forward. There is nothing wrong for a student or a parent saying, "I don't know how to do this." A parent, as you were saying, modeling that growth mindset and showing their child, they're happy to say, "I don't know the answer." Teachers will often say that in the classroom, "I'm not sure how we're going to progress here, but let me ask some people and come back to this. I think that's so important. I think the other thing is parents, and maybe in particular anxious parents really don't like seeing their children struggling when it comes to maths, and we really need to get rid of that or that anxious parents because they want to protect their children from having that negative experience. And it comes back to those myths that we were talking about before.

We have this idea that struggling in maths is bad, but struggling is okay.

Ben Allen:

I agree, even productive struggle.

Sarah Buckley:

Yes, productive struggle, because it's also then so wonderful, after we've struggled, we've got help, we've got the answer. We get to that point, and it feels so much better that we've gone through that productive struggle. So it's okay as a parent to see your child struggling for a little bit. You don't have to jump in immediately to help them. You can let them struggle a little bit before you jump in. I think that's really important.

Ben Allen:

And that helps too. Even at school, you're thinking about if you're solving a problem, you're building strategies while doing that setting too, to bring back into different contexts. That's right. If you're struggling a little bit while you're figuring it out, that's okay.

Sarah Buckley:

That's right. I think often, it's similar to the way that we view mistake making. Often when people make mistakes in maths, they feel like, that's it. I can't do it. And because of that fixed mindset that might be underlying that, they're not likely to have another go. Whereas in another subject area, say sport, they might be much more forgiving of that mistake and instantly have another go, and go, "That's fine. Mistakes are fine. It's just part of the process of getting better at this skill that I'm developing." Why don't we have the same mentality when it comes to maths? We should.

Ben Allen:

I agree. We should. I don't have an answer for it, but we should because there's no reason as to why it shouldn't be viewed like other discipline areas where that mistake or struggle should be built into the process of learning. And we should be more open about that, making it visible.

Sarah Buckley:

Absolutely.

Ben Allen:

So just going back to the point, Sarah, around parents talking positively about maths at home, supporting their child with homework, all those things that are in the resource, just wanted to unpack a little bit more. Some of the jobs or fields, I've heard, as a teacher, often parents say to their students, "Oh, don't worry, you don't need maths for that job," but there's often elements of mathematics in lots of things that we do. And I know in the resource, it talks about a few of those, but just maths in everyday life outside of school in the field, where can you see other highlights of where this might occur?

Sarah Buckley:

We can see it a lot in the home. So there's all the ones that are typically talked about, so cooking, gardening, when we're doing finance for the home, when we're buying things.

Ben Allen:

I think it's interesting that we're just having this conversation now where we can reel off many aspects.

Sarah Buckley:

Yes.

Ben Allen:

I even think, this one maybe is a closer link, but trades. And often I've heard students say, "To be a builder, don't need to use mathematics."

Sarah Buckley:

I would like my builder to use maths, please.

Ben Allen:

Exactly right. But just highlighting to students, if they've got that fixed mindset, it's really important to unpick, "Well, actually, there are elements in almost every field that you would be using mathematics."

Sarah Buckley:

That's right. We use it in so many different areas of our life. And we also use mathematical thinking in lots of different areas of our life, and I think that's emphasized in parts of the resource. I think the point of this research and the idea of positive maths talk is we don't want people to close the door on maths because of any type of negative belief or negative thinking. There are so many people telling parents and students, "You need maths for so many different things." So why not continue learning? You don't need to necessarily be doing the highest level of maths, but understand that it is so beneficial when you're buying a house, when you're buying a car and you're choosing mobile phone plan, when you are doing so many different things, working out a recipe and you have to multiply it because you've got people coming over for dinner.

It's just so useful in so many different aspects of our life. We wouldn't want there to be a barrier that's stopping our lives from being more efficient. And then we've got to talk about all the career pathways. There are so many students that I've talked to at university who have told me they didn't go down a particular path that they were super interested in because they found out that it needed to involve maths. So my background is in psychology and there is a lot of statistics involved in psychology. And when I have said to people my background's psych, they'll be like, "Oh, I was really interested in that, but when I found out it involved maths, I didn't do it." That's such a shame. That shouldn't be happening.

Ben Allen:

And this resource and what underpins it, the positive maths talk, that growth mindset, all of those things together really keep that door open and the pathways clear for us to talk about this in a way that really supports our students and our children moving forward.

Sarah Buckley:

Yeah. Well, the other thing we should say is that the resource isn't designed to be something that's time intensive for parents to have a look at. We know parents are busy, and we don't want to add more to their load. And the resource is just designed to highlight some things, to encourage self-reflection around the language being used around maths. So it's not supposed to be something that's really going to add to all the things, the list of things that parents have to do.

Ben Allen:

So to end this podcast, Sarah, I thought we could reflect and come back to what are three key takeaways that we've discussed today. If it's all right with you, I'll share first.

Sarah Buckley:

Sure.

Ben Allen:

So one of the first things I wanted to talk about, so my first takeaway was when you spoke about what is positive maths talk. And it's a lot clearer, and it's not as scary as when you first think about it. It's literally talking about mathematics in a positive light to those around you, even if your experience yourself maybe wasn't as positive, but you're trying to build that growth mindset in your child or your students to continue to learn mathematics. And I love how simply you put it and explained. It's just having that self-reflection moment and checking in with yourself about how you're talking about mathematics. And I'm going to bridge that to my second point because that in itself, the research behind that and how you explain what the research says can actually dispel some of the myths around learning mathematics.

And we spoke about some of those myths that are quite black and white, girls maybe aren't as good at maths, boys are, those sorts of things, and this can really help unpack and start to dispel some of those myths. So that was my second takeaway. And my third takeaway is the resource itself been a really great thing to use for parents. It's not a hard thing to use, but it's really about, again, just tying it back into that self-reflection piece at home and trying to highlight the avenues where mathematics can be explored in the home, but also pausing and thinking about the way you're speaking about mathematics to your child. Also, tying it to mathematical pathways that your child might want to look into their career.

Sarah Buckley:

Yeah. Well, you've pitched some really good ones. Now I can't pick them as well. I think those points are awesome. I would add some of them on top of it. So you mentioned, when we are thinking about positive maths talk, self-reflection, and self-awareness, if you are, as a parent, finding it difficult to get started with that, think about, one way to figure out whether you might not be talking about maths positively is to compare it to how you're talking about other subject areas. So that's a really simple way to highlight any differences that might be there. That's one. Two is the idea that you don't have to know the answer to the math that your child is doing to have a positive impact on their relationship and attitude towards maths. That's super key. So all you have to be doing is encouraging that positive disposition and modeling that growth mindset. That's really important. And the third is just empowering parents. The whole reason why we've developed this resource is because you have such an important role in shaping the way that your children see maths.

And you can do this in very simple ways that aren't going to take a lot of time, but it's going to have a profound impact on their pathway and their career opportunities. So why not?

Ben Allen:

Sarah, it has been an absolute pleasure talking to you today about positive maths talk. Thank you for joining us.

Sarah Buckley:

Oh, thank you so much, Ben. I've enjoyed it too.

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