How Do Math Games Help Dyslexic Kids Learn?

Dyslexia is often described as a “learning disability involving difficulties in acquiring and processing language that is typically manifested by a lack of proficiency in reading, spelling, and writing” despite having a normal intelligence level. In layman’s terms, dyslexia is a state where learners get confused with letters and numbers and are often unable to read and comprehend them. This syndrome is often found in kids who are learning to read and write, with language and math being the two worst casualties of dyslexia.

Dyslexia, obviously because it is not a ‘disease’, doesn’t have any cure or remedy. The syndrome can only be treated with proper learning tools and techniques that help dyslexic children read, learn and write successfully. Famous Hollywood director Steven Spielberg, who successfully battled dyslexia, says that “movies really helped me...kind of saved me from shame, from guilt, from putting it on myself, from making it my burden when it wasn't my burden. I think making movies was my great escape, it was how I could get away from all that.” While Spielberg fought dyslexia with movies, others like noted author and mathematician Lewis Carroll, enigmatic entrepreneur Richard Branson and talented actor Tom Cruise chose to fight it with the help of learning tools such as interactive math games and with the support and encouragement of parents and teachers.

Interactive Math Game Ideas for Learning Place Value

As popular actor Orlando Bloom has said - “Dyslexia is not due to lack of intelligence, it's a lack of access. It's like, if you're dyslexic, you have all the information you need, but find it harder to process”. Access to the right tools and methods paired with the right techniques and knowledge about the process are essential to fight dyslexia. Several interactive math games online have been made in scientific ways to help dyslexic learners comprehend elementary knowledge input.
When it comes to learning place value with interactive math games, don’t be alarmed if kids make up numbers that don’t make any logical sense at all or arrive at wrong answers. However, encourage them to read out the numbers with the ones, tens and hundreds in place. This will help them grasp the digits and identify the numbers while being taught in school. Once kids identify digits and their placement, understanding math concepts will be relatively easier.

Learning Time with Math Games 

Dyslexic kids find it difficult to read time from clocks and take long to understand the concept of time on the wall. Here’s a simple but effective way to help them. Make two clocks from cardboard - one with a long minute hand with dashes as minutes and the other hand with a short hour hand with the numbers 1-12 marked. Explain slowly that the minute hand is the longer one because the word ‘minute’ is longer than ‘hour’. Move the hand five dashes and explain that 5 minutes is as long as the time he takes to brush his teeth. Move the hour hand on the other clock from 1 to 2 and explain that for the hand to move from one number to the next - 1 hour – is roughly as long as it takes him to get ready for school. Make sure the hour and minute hands are made from a colored paper to sustain his interest in the learning.

Interactive math games are sure to help dyslexic kids learn math with ease, besides proving to be a wonderful and fun experience.

Making Fractions Fun with Cool Math Games

Use Cool Math Games to Make Fractions Interesting and Fun

The term ‘fraction’ has been derived from the Latin word ‘fractus’ which means ‘broken’. For beginners and new learners, let’s just describe fraction as counting a part of something. There are innumerable ways of introducing little learners to the world of fractions and cool math games are especially helpful in this case. Lets acquaint ourselves with a few cool math games that make teaching and learning fractions as fun as possible!

The Magic Number ‘1’ In Fractions

Always note that if the numerator equals the denominator, then the fraction is considered to be whole number 1. This is the golden rule of fractions: 2/2 is 1, 99/99 is 1, 200/200 is also 1. Teach them this with the cool fraction games that are listed below. 

Flour Rounds 

You will need flour rounds, markers and marker boards for this cool math game. Hand over two flour rounds to each student and advise them to keep one on top of the other. Explain to them that one flour round is one whole. Instruct them to fold one flour round into half and do the same for them to follow. Ask the students how many rounds of flour they have with them and instruct them to explain their responses using the props. Write down the responses they elicit and add the two children’s answers to show them that two halves equal to one!

Paper Crafts 

You will need papers of various colors, crayons and base-ten blocks. Hand over a set of four colored papers to each kid. Have them keep the first one as it is. Let them fold the second in half, the third in one-third and the fourth into one-fourth. Ask them to write the fraction of each fold on each folded paper and do the same for them to follow and understand the concept of fractions. 

Yum Pies

Gather yum pies and cutting utensils for this cool math game. Divide the class into groups with inconsistent number of students. Hand over a pie to each group and share it equally among the team members and warn them against eating the pies up! Choose a group leader and ask her to share her observations on the number of pieces each member in her team got. Do this with all the teams so that the class can get an in-depth understanding of fractions. Make sure to distribute equal pieces to each little one after the lesson is well-learnt!

How can Cool Math Games Online Improve Grades?

There’s no point trying to add when you haven’t learnt to count yet! Clear concepts come only with regular practice and regular practice in turn makes kids very slapdash with math worksheets, problems and activities. Besides breaking the language barriers that kids from diverse backgrounds face, cool math games minimize teachers’ and parents’ involvement and develop leadership and team-playing qualities in them. 

 

Skills of Problem-solving

The moment kids embark on a math problem they invariably get lost in the tangles of words and fail to arrive at a conclusive answer. Traditional ways of teaching math can be extremely suffocating to kids who find it difficult to comprehend. A step-by-step approach of cool math games that break up complex steps for kids to understand and solve then solve is indispensible to the learning of math. Cool math games create coherent situations that students find simple enough to unravel and therefore develop an interest.

Ability to Form Relationships 

Cool math games are generally segmented into steps that required to be solved independently of each other in order to arrive at an overall answer. A step-by-step approach adopted by games developers help kids break up the problem and solve. The ability to form relationships take kids a long way in terms of social skills and speech and writing coordination. Every subject is based on inherent relationships between each element, cracking which students can go a long way in improving grades.  

Logical and Practical Thinking Process 

Thankfully, today’s educational system is not identical to the erstwhile teaching traditions which had never given kids to explore as much as they do now. There are plenty of math games online that give students a world of options to explore and experiment with new and innovative techniques and learn in the process. The horde of cool math online encourages kids to think practically and with use logic over traditional knowledge. At higher grades, kids apply the knowledge to other subjects like science and social studies to understand complex and advanced concepts independently. It’s therefore obvious how cool math online go a long way in improving grades in other subjects as well. 

Examine and Understand Patterns 

Studying patterns and identifying is imperative to accomplishing goals. Cool math games are all about patterns and patterns help to predict what will be the next in sequence and escape the monotony of tedious and long math process of solving problems. If one studies patterns in math games ideally with precision, then it’s easy to arrive at an answer in a jiffy, example being the sum of numbers 1 to 100. If studied carefully, it can be noticed that 1 and 100 sums up to 101, 2 and 99 makes 101, 3 and 98 too makes 101 and that this pattern is repeated 50 times counting from 1 to 100. Therefore, multiplying 101 into 50 can be the simplest way to arrive at the solution! This sense and inclination of patterns can make students realize the relation between each topic and score higher grades. Understanding patterns helps kids choose a lucrative and exciting career path when they grow up, that of cryptography.