Math Therapy Can Prepare Students to Engage in Productive Struggle

Excerpted from Math Therapy?: 5 Steps to Help Your Students Overcome Math Trauma and Build a Better Relationship With Math by Vanessa Vakharia .?

Pay special attention the next time one of your students says they’re not “good” at math. Ask them what they mean when they say that, and make sure it’s clear that while math is for everyone, the way they feel about their math skills now is transient and will change, but more importantly: Our math ability is just one small, teeny part of our entire personalities—it’s not everything, in the scheme of things!??

The immediate goal of Math Therapy is to unpack math trauma as the starting point to healing one’s relationship with math. As I mentioned when I shared the 5 M’s of Math Therapy earlier in this chapter, it is unpacking that trauma that serves as a jumping-off point to helping us understand our math stories, and subsequently, it is those math stories that allow us to take a deeper look into what we believe about what we are worthy and capable of.?

Once we help our students face their math trauma, we open the gateway to be able to do several things:?

• Empower students to learn to embrace the struggle necessary to solve math problems in the classroom—and to solve problems outside the classroom?

• Equip students to take risks in math class—and in real life?

• Encourage students to develop a creative approach to problem-solving in the classroom—and outside the classroom?

• Energize students to believe they are capable of exceeding their expectations both in our classrooms—and in the pursuit of their wildest dreams?

"The goal of Math Therapy is to empower students to build a better relationship with math, and ultimately with themselves!"