2 Techniques to help remain in the Growth Zone

To help monitor your anxiety levels, it can be useful to keep a printed version of the Growth Zone model around, or draw your own version. When you’re studying maths, consciously think about your level of anxiety and place a counter (you could use a coin or a small stone) within the corresponding zone. Assess your anxiety levels on a regular basis throughout your study period, and if your anxiety reaches a point where you are unable to study productively, try some of these techniques to reduce it.

• Take a short break and come back fresh. If you are struggling with a topic, it can be useful to go away and think about something else for a while, and then come back and try again. It may be helpful to return to a point where you understood the work and carry on from there. If you are struggling to answer a particular question, then start again from the beginning with a clean sheet of paper (don’t look at what you did before), or try a similar question and see if answering that one helps.
• Move away from your study space. Changing your physical location, for example, it can help to go for a walk so you can think about your maths problem.
• Start small – do something easy and then build up. If you work your way up gradually, you might reduce your sensitivity to the maths that is causing you anxiety.
• Try to explain the maths to someone else. Trying to explain a topic to someone else, and verbalising the problem you’re experiencing, can often help with your own understanding. (It doesn’t really matter whether your listener comes to understand it themselves.)
• Ask for some help. Maths can be taught in many different ways. If you don’t understand the way something is being taught, ask someone that knows about maths if they can explain it in a different way, or have a look online for any tutorials that may help.
• Move on to a different topic. If you’ve been struggling with a particular topic, it can help to look at something new and situate yourself within the growth or comfort zone, before returning to the problem.

These techniques may not remove your anxiety completely, but will hopefully reduce it to a level where you can return to studying maths. When you do start again, it may be necessary to work within your Comfort Zone until you have regained confidence and are able to move into the Growth Zone. If your anxiety is still at a point where you can’t return to studying, revisit the strategies in Session 3 and use them to get yourself into a better frame of mind prior to coming back to your studies.