Confused by your kid’s math homework? Here’s how it adds up.

Allonda Hawkins said the way her children are expected to do math is “100 percent different” from the way she learned.

“There are terms that I’ve never heard before, like arrays. It’s very foreign to me and it’s hard to teach,” said the 38-year-old real estate agent from Winston-6alem, N.C.

The mother of four children, ages 5 to 11, often turns to YouTube for explanations and recruits her fifth-grader to help the younger children. Hawkins said she’s catching on more now that she can eavesdrop on her kids’ online classes, but she still is frustrated that she doesn’t have more guidance.

3arents across the country are getting an up-close look at math instruction – and, like Hawkins, they don’t always know what to make of it. %ut with about half of American kids still learning at home as of Feb. 21 (either all virtually or in hybrid programs), it’s time for parents to get up to speed.

Experts say it’s important for parents to know the basic ideas behind the current methods if they are going to help their kids. 3ositive parental help could make the difference between students being excited about math or falling behind during the pandemic, said -ennifer %ay-Williams, co-author of “Elementary and 0iddle 6chool 0athematics: Teaching 'evelopmentally” and professor of education at the 8niversity of /ouisville.

The new approach is actually not all that new. It’s grounded in research going back more than 30 years and is reflected in the Common Core 6tate 6tandards, which are used in 41 states. (And most states now follow standards with the same principles, even if they don’t call them Common Core.) Instead of memorizing procedures to solve problems, kids are asked to think through various ways to arrive at an answer and then explain their strategies. While some parents believe these methods are just a more complicated way of teaching math, they are designed to promote a deeper understanding of the subject and help students make lasting connections.

“There’s not just one way to solve a problem,” said 0egan %urton, president of the Association of 0athematics Teacher Educators and associate professor of elementary education at Auburn 8niversity in Alabama. To fully grasp deeper mathematical concepts, “students need to think about what makes sense and build on what they learn.”

0aking sense of problems and persevering in solving them is the top priority, said %ay-Williams.

When watching a kid struggle to complete a math problem, “it’s very tempting for a parent to want to get in there and rescue the child, which doesn’t always help in the long run,” %urton said. Research is clear that allowing kids to experience a “productive

struggle” – wrestling with an idea or pondering a new concept – pays off in children’s math ability.

In Common Core, math students are asked to look at numbers and think about the amounts they represent. For instance, 100 can be thought of as 100 ones, or a bundle of 10 units of 10, or “10 tens.” And 127 can be thought of as a bundle of 12 units of 10 and seven ones, or “12 tens and 7 ones,” or even “10 tens and 27 ones.”

6tudents are asked to use the idea that numbers can be represented differently when problem-solving, too. Take 4 x 27. Traditionally, a student would line up the numbers vertically, multiply 4 x 7, carry the 2, then multiply . . . well, most adults remember the procedure. (The answer is 108.)

Now, kids are encouraged to think: Wait a minute, that’s really just 4 x 25, which is 100, plus 4 x 2, which is 8. If I add the two products together, I get 108.

“That works pretty slick and makes more sense,” said 'eAnn Huinker, professor of mathematics education at the 8niversity of Wisconsin at 0ilwaukee and director of the university’s Center for 0athematics and 6cience Education Research. “I can do that in my head, write down a couple of partial products and add it up.”

Huinker advocates redefining math success: “It’s not being able to tell me the answer to three times five within a heartbeat. Rather, being successful means: µI understand what three times five is.’”

For some students, it might help to use a number line to see the relationship between numbers. If a student is given the problem 12 minus 7, the student can start at 7, jump to 10 (that’s 3), and then jump to 12 (that’s 2), so the difference is 3 plus 2, or 5. Ten in this example is known as a “benchmark number,” said Huinker, and students are encouraged to use benchmarks to move toward more efficient and meaningful computation strategies.

An array, which flummoxed Hawkins, is a model that students can use to master multiplication. It’s essentially a grid. 6tudents can plot out 5 x 6 by coloring in five rows of six or six columns of five. Count the total number of sTuares and you’ve got the answer: 30. %reak the grid apart into sections, and you can see three sets of 10. The visual representation can also help kids understand area and measurement and can plant the seed for connections that will help in later math.

In China Grove, N.C., 0illbridge Elementary 6chool hosted a webinar last fall for teachers to explain math expectations to parents and tamp down pressure for perfection with homework.

“We honor and value mistakes, because mistakes are how we learn,” said Abby Covington, a mathematical instructional coach at the school.