Researchers say math anxiety starts young

As part of normal development, children become adept at identifying which of two numbers of items is bigger, but Ansari found that those with high math anxiety were slower and less accurate at that task, and brain scans showed activity different from that of people with low math stress doing the same tasks.

Because understanding numerical magnitude is a foundation for other calculations, Ansari suggests that small, early deficiencies in that area can lead to frustration and negative reactions to math problems over time.

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Moreover, math anxiety can become a generational problem, with adults uncomfortable with math passing negative feelings on to their children or students.

Beilock found that female teachers with high anxiety about math affected their students’ math performance and their beliefs about math ability. In a study of a dozen first-grade and five second-grade teachers and their students, researchers found no difference in the performance of boys and girls in math at the beginning of the year. By the end of the school year, however, girls taught by a teacher with high math anxiety started to score lower than boys in math.

That study, and similar ones, highlight a need for more training for parents and teachers on how to conquer their own math fears and avoid passing them to children, Beilock and Ansari said.

“Teacher math anxiety is really an epidemic,” Ansari said. “I think a lot of people go into elementary teaching because they don’t want to teach high school math or science.”

Eugene A. Geist, an associate professor at Ohio University and the author of “Children Are Born Mathematicians,” works with math teachers to create “anxiety-free classrooms” for students. He advises teachers to have students focus on learning mathematics processes, rather than relying on the answer keys in a textbook, which can undermine both their own and the teacher’s confidence in their math skills.

“If I give the answer, you immediately forget about the question. If I don’t give you the answer, you will still have questions and you will be thinking about the problem long after,” he said.

By contrast, constantly referring to an answer key can undermine both students’ and teachers’ confidence in their own math skills, and encourage students to focus on being right over learning.

Likewise, Willis, the California neurologist, said that teachers can help students reduce their fear of participating during math discussions by asking all students to answer every question, using scratch paper or electronic clickers to “bet” on answers, and talking about the problem as a group.

“It helps with wait time [between question and answer], increases participation and decreases mistake fear,” Willis said.

— Education Week