Mind Games

If you want kids to learn math, let them play games.

That's the philosophy behind an innovative new math program taking place at 64 elementary schools across California's Orange County. And the fun times are yielding big results. According to a story in the LA Times, this year saw about a 4.5 percent increase in the number of elementary students statewide scoring a rating of "proficient" or "advanced" on standardized tests. In Orange County, that number was closer to 13 percent.

The program was created by the MIND Research Institute, and is based on the concept of learning through pictures, or spatial-temporal reasoning. Through computer games and interactive visuals in the classroom, students are taught fractions, equations and other math skills. Students spend two lessons a week in the computer lab, where they work at their own pace and software tracks their work. Teachers can access the data at any time so they can identify a struggling student or know if a lesson needs to be repeated.

Students seem to actually enjoy the new learning process, too. "I have to drag them out [of the computer lab]," Aurora Esquivel, a teacher at Lydia Romero-Cruz Elementary School told the LA Times. "They'll be late to lunch and recess to keep working on the computer."

Sacrificing kickball or chicken nuggets to learn more math? You know this program must be working well.

Photo courtesy of stock.xchng.