Q&A: Curry Professor Studies the Most Effective Ways to Teach Math – and Make It Fun | Research & Discovery - University of Virginia

Next, Berry will offer tips for parents to help their kids find more joy and success in math.

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In the first of a two-part series, UVA professor Robert Berry discusses the state of math at the early childhood and elementary school levels, the national policy issues that influence how children are taught and how we can improve, according to Whitelaw Reid, University News Associate Office of University Communications.

Curry School professor Robert Berry says the way math is taught has changed over the last half-century.
Photo: Dan Addison, UVA Communications

Robert Berry disagrees with the notion that – similar to drinking milk – kids either love or hate math.

The University of Virginia’s Samuel Braley Gray Professor of Education believes children enter the world as “emergent mathematicians, naturally curious, and trying to make sense of their world using mathematical thinking.”

The problem, according to Berry, is maintaining that curiosity, rather than suppressing it. He studies how teachers can foster such curiosity, as well as the national policy shifts and equity issues that impact how children are taught...

“I believe that children do not hate mathematics; they may hate their experiences with mathematics that do not allow them to investigate their curiosities and experience joy,” he said.

In the first of a two-part series, UVA Today caught up with Berry, of UVA’s Curry School of Education and Human Development, to take a deeper dive into the subject.
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Source: University of Virginia