It takes years of practice and study to become a proficient Singapore Math teacher and a good adviser to fellow educators. Although you cannot do much to speed up the process of acquiring new experience, you can achieve better results if you follow the below mentioned rules from day one:

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Practice everything you teach

Singapore Math can be tricky: simple problems can be more challenging than the difficult ones and certain methods, such as writing equations horizontally instead of vertically, are counter intuitive and require extra practice to get used to. A good Singapore Math teacher is the one, who always come prepared. It means that you should not limit yourself only to the teacher’s book or Singapore math training, but you should also practice solving every math problem from the workbook at least once, before trying to do the same thing with your students. You will not help your students much if you get stuck in the middle of solving the problem together in class or if you will not be able to explain why a specific method was used to reach the conclusion. Spend as much time as necessary to practice every technique, which is new to you, even if it means solving more math problems than the ones included in the workbook. Check how well you understand the methods used in every lesson, in order to be prepared to answer the questions of your students and better explain the method.

Don’t forget about the manipulatives

To be truly successful, Singapore Math requires that all students are able to work with math aids or the so called manipulatives and use them to illustrate math problems. It is not enough, if you show children how manipulatives can be applied to solving math problem. Every child should be able to touch these math aids and work with them on their own or in small groups. This step is absolutely crucial in order to give math a concrete feeling. If your school cannot afford a set of math aids for every student, try to come up with useful alternatives. For example, you can ask your students to create geometric figures at home and bring them to school to use during geometry classes.

Stress the importance of after school practice

Isn’t it odd that we all accept the fact that in order to read better we have to practice every day, but when a math teacher ask students to do the same thing with math, it is suddenly too much? The truth is that math skills are similar to language abilities and they cannot be mastered without regular training. To ensure that your students achieve their full potential, you have to stress the importance of practicing math as often, as possible. Luckily for you, you are teaching kids math according to a method, which by many students is perceived as fun and interesting, so convincing them to spend more time practicing might be less difficult than you think. Find good math resources for teachers, which can be used by students to practice at home and which are versatile enough to not become too boring too quickly.

This article has been written by Alex Buka, he is a writer and Social Media Marketer with 3+ years of experience in math SEO copywriting and social media management.

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