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Three friendly speech bubbles saying Let's work it out together, Mistakes are useful and Try one more, over a calm sunrise, beside the cover of Escape the Pyramid, Level 1.

Field Notes

Maths Anxiety: How Parents Can Help (and What to Avoid)

4 min read
  • Learning science
  • Parents
  • Maths anxiety

If maths makes you tense, you are in good company, and you did not do anything wrong. Researchers have studied how maths worries can pass between adults and children, and the findings point to something hopeful: how we do maths together matters more than whether we love it. Here is what each study found, and what we can try.

Why worry gets in the way

Ramirez and colleagues tested 88 first graders and 66 second graders on their maths, their working memory (the mental scratchpad we use to hold numbers while we work) and their maths anxiety. Among children with strong working memory, higher anxiety went with lower maths achievement, about half a school year behind their less anxious classmates. Children with weaker working memory were not affected in the same way, possibly because they tended to use simpler strategies such as counting on their fingers (Ramirez, Gunderson, Levine and Beilock, 2013). Worry can crowd the scratchpad, which is one reason a relaxed start helps.

Teachers and parents: a link, not blame

Beilock and colleagues followed 17 first and second grade teachers and their students (52 boys and 65 girls). At the start of the year, a teacher's maths anxiety was unrelated to her students' maths achievement. By the end of the year, the more anxious the teacher, the more her girls (not boys) believed that boys are good at maths and girls are good at reading, and the lower those girls' achievement (Beilock and colleagues, 2010). The study links the pattern to beliefs about who is good at maths, and it does not suggest teachers do not care.

Maloney and colleagues studied 438 first and second graders and their parents. Children of more maths-anxious parents learned less maths over the school year and became more maths anxious themselves, but only when those parents reported helping with maths homework often. When parents helped less often, there was no such link. Parents' maths anxiety did not predict reading results (Maloney and colleagues, 2015).

Two cards. Anxious parent with frequent homework help: children learned less maths and had more maths anxiety. Anxious parent with less homework help: no link between the parent's anxiety and the child's maths results.
The 2015 finding in one picture.

Read that carefully. It does not say anxious parents should stay away. The researchers said the same: we cannot simply tell anxious parents to get involved, we need better tools. They suggested things like maths books, board and computer games and apps that let parents and children enjoy maths together. It also shows a link in one group of families, not a rule for every family.

A gentler way in

In a study by Berkowitz and colleagues, 587 first graders from 22 schools in the Chicago area used a Bedtime Math app with their parents over a school year, with families doing maths together at home. Children who did the maths stories gained more than the comparison group, and the benefit was especially strong for children of the most maths-anxious parents (Berkowitz and colleagues, 2015). The idea is simple: relaxed, playful maths talk, a few minutes at a time, rather than homework rescue.

Try this

  • Be curious, not quick. Ask "what do you notice?" before you show a method.
  • Watch the labels. Remarks such as "I'm just not a maths person" are easy to pick up. Try "this is tricky, let's work it out".
  • Let mistakes be useful. "A wrong answer tells us something" turns the mood around.
  • Keep it short and playful. Stairs, snacks, shopping, a puzzle, then stop while it is still fun.
  • Share the load. If maths homework is a stress for you both, tell the teacher. A real worry about your child's learning or wellbeing is a job for a teacher or doctor, not a blog post.
Four rows pairing a phrase to avoid with a kinder one: I was never a maths person becomes this is tricky, let's work it out; hurry it's easy becomes take your time, what do you notice; just do it my way becomes show me how you thought about it; oh no a wrong answer becomes a wrong answer tells us something, why.
Small swaps. None of these is a rule, just a direction.
Five coloured cards: pick one thing, ask do not tell, listen, wonder together, stop on a high.
A relaxed five-minute maths chat.

Where a puzzle adventure fits

Escape the Pyramid, Level 1 is a puzzle adventure gamebook, so you do not read it in order: each answer is the page number of your next door. It has 45 locked chambers and 6 treasure rooms, with hints and full answers in the back, so nobody has to be the expert. Parent and child can puzzle it out side by side, pencil in hand. It is a book of puzzles, not a course or a treatment for worry, and it was not part of any study mentioned here. Its easy level is aimed at teens and adults, so younger children may want a hand.

A chamber page of Escape the Pyramid Level 1, The Scribe's Spill: a drawn door, the ink blot rules, a pyramid with blotted numbers and a Next Door box. Nothing is solved.
A chamber page as printed, at low resolution. Each chamber is one puzzle kind of several in the book.

For classrooms and homes with younger learners, the Math Escape Room Bundle packs five printable rooms for Grades 1 to 7. Teams work together and talk it through, which is a low-pressure way to practise. It is a digital download you print yourself.

Books mentioned

Escape the Pyramid, Level 1 (Easy) cover

Escape the Pyramid, Level 1 (Easy)

A puzzle adventure gamebook with 45 locked chambers and 6 treasure rooms, hints and full answers in the back.

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Games mentioned

Math Escape Room Bundle, Grades 1 to 7, first picture of its Etsy listing

Math Escape Room Bundle, Grades 1 to 7

Five printable classroom math escape rooms in one download, from Grade 1 to Grade 7. Cheaper than buying them one by one.

See it on Etsy

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Cover images are the ones we have on file; the book you receive may show a slightly different cover.

Designed by Creouts Publishing using original prompts and AI (Claude by Anthropic). Illustrations made with AI image tools. Digital download: nothing is shipped.

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