Attention, Memory and Math

1. Attention, Memory and Math Monique Cunin Fall 2011

2. Outline • What is a learning disability? • Characteristics • Attention • Memory • Attention and Math • Memory and Math • Impact on Life Skills • Assessing Math • Strategies for Helping • Resources • Further Use • What I Learned

3. What is a learning disability? • Learning disabilities are a group of conditions that make it difficult for a person to learn and retain new information. • Areas affected: • Academics • Social Skills • To receive services under IDEA a student must show a significant difference in IQ and achievement.

4. Characteristics • Poor cognition and metacognition • Low academic achievement • Poor memory • Attention problems and hyperactivity • Poor social skills • Poor self-concept • Poor motivation • Debilitating mood • Adaptive behavior deficits • Disruptive behaviors

5. Attention • Being able to stay focused on a relevant task • Students with learning disabilities may • Focus on other things in the environment • Be unable to focus on a task for an extended period of time • Inability to pay attention to a lesson = a lesson not fully learned!

6. Memory • Working • Storing information in the short term while working on a task. • If a student can’t store the information short term, they will not be able to recall it later. • Long-term • Information that you can recall, days, weeks, months, years from now. • If information did not make it into a student’s working memory, it is not in their long-term memory.

7. Attention and Math • If a student is unable to pay attention to a math lesson: • They may miss information • They may miss an important step • Missing these steps can cause them to struggle in later math lessons. • Many math classes build upon previously learned material.

8. Memory and Math • Working Memory • If a student cannot remember how to solve a problem, • They may practice doing it incorrectly • Long term Memory • Students may struggle to solve future problems because they can’t remember how to do a previous problem. • Example: single digit addition to two digit addition

9. Impact on Life Skills • Students who struggle in math may struggle with • Managing Finances • Balancing a Checkbook • Paying for groceries • Pay for social activities such as • Eating out • Have limited job opportunities • Must be able to do basic math to work in even minimum wage jobs.

10. Assessing Math Skills • Formal • Woodcock Johnson III Normative Update Tests of Achievement • Calculation, math fluency, applied problems • Informal • CBM • EasyCBM or Intervention Central • Ask students questions as they are working • Quizzes • Daily Journals • Solve a teacher problem • Write about how they solved it

11. Strategies to Help • Attention • Keep attention of all students • Hands on activities • Student engagement • Opportunities for all students to respond • Dry Erase Markers and Desks • Manipulative • Limit distractions in the room

12. Strategies to Help • Memory • Review skills necessary for a new skill you are introducing • Make sure students practice correctly • Chunk information • Mnemonics (Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally), FOIL • Decide what it is relevant that your students remember • Calculators can be requested as an accommodation or modification depending on the material.

13. What I learned • The specific characteristics of learning disabilities can affect how a student learns math. • Classroom strategies and accommodations can help offset these.

14. Further Use • Techniques and resources will be used • To enhance existing curriculum • Improve teaching

15. Resources for Math Practice • Math Playground • http://www.mathplayground.com/games.html • Has games that students can play. • Discovery Kids : Web Math • http://www.webmath.com/index3.html?campaign=flyout_students_webmath_k8 • Shows students step by step how to solve problems

16. Bibliography •     Mercer, C. D., Mercer, A.R., & Pullen, P. C. (2011). Students with learning problems (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.