Most children who struggle with word problems can do the maths — they struggle to work out which maths the words are asking for. The fix is a consistent routine: understand the story, picture it, plan the calculation, then check the answer makes sense. Below is that four-step routine, the questions to ask at each step, and the traps that catch children out, with worked examples.
Why word problems are hard
A word problem layers several skills: reading, understanding a situation, deciding which information matters, choosing an operation, calculating, and checking. A child can be fine at each one separately and still freeze when they come together. Struggling readers have an extra hurdle before the maths even starts.
Many children are taught to hunt for “keywords” — altogether means add, left means subtract. It’s a tempting shortcut that often fails. “Sam has 5 more stickers than Ali. Sam has 12. How many does Ali have?” contains “more”, but the answer needs subtraction. Understanding the situation beats spotting words.
The four-step routine
Step 1: Understand — what’s happening?
Read the problem twice. The first time for the story, the second for the details. Then ask your child to retell it in their own words, without numbers: “Someone has some stickers, gives some away, and we need to know how many are left.”
- “What’s happening in this story?”
- “What is the question asking you to find?”
- “What will the answer be — a number of what?” (stickers, metres, pounds…)
Step 2: Picture — draw it
Drawings turn words into something you can reason about. Simple bars, circles or dots are enough; this isn’t art. Many schools teach bar models for this step, where quantities are drawn as rectangles side by side.
- “Can you draw what’s happening?”
- “Which numbers do we know? Where do they go in the picture?”
- “Which part of the picture is the mystery?”
Step 3: Plan and solve
Now the operation usually becomes obvious from the picture.
- “Looking at your drawing, what do you need to do to find the mystery part?”
- “Is there more than one step?”
- “Is any information not needed?”
Step 4: Check — does it make sense?
The step children skip most. Train it as a habit.
- “Before you calculate: roughly what should the answer be?”
- “Put your answer back into the story. Does it work?”
- “Did you answer the actual question, with the right units?”
Worked example 1: a one-step problem (age ~7–8)
“There are 32 children on a bus. At the first stop, 9 get off and 5 get on. How many children are on the bus now?”
- Understand: children on a bus, some leave, some join; how many now?
- Picture: a bar of 32, take a chunk of 9 away, add a chunk of 5.
- Plan: two steps — subtract 9, then add 5. (32 − 9 = 23, 23 + 5 = 28.)
- Check: more got off than on, so the answer should be a bit less than 32. 28 makes sense.
Worked example 2: the “more than” trap (age ~8–10)
“Priya has 14 more marbles than Leo. Priya has 41 marbles. How many does Leo have?”
- Understand: Priya has more. We know Priya’s amount. We need Leo’s.
- Picture: two bars. Priya’s is longer by 14. Priya’s total bar is 41.
- Plan: Leo’s bar is Priya’s minus the extra 14: 41 − 14 = 27.
- Check: 27 + 14 = 41. ✓ And Leo has fewer, as the story says.
A keyword hunter sees “more” and adds, getting 55. The drawing prevents that.
Worked example 3: extra information (age ~10–12)
“A cinema has 18 rows of 24 seats. Tickets cost £7. On Saturday, 350 people came. How many seats were empty?”
- Understand: total seats, minus people. The ticket price is irrelevant.
- Plan: 18 × 24 = 432 seats; 432 − 350 = 82 empty.
- Check: 350 + 82 = 432 ✓. Answer is in seats, not pounds.
Ask “Is any information not needed?” as a routine — tests include distractors on purpose.
Common traps and how to spot them
- Keyword guessing. Ask them to retell the story without numbers before calculating.
- Using every number. Not every number in the problem is needed.
- Stopping after step one in multi-step problems. “Have you answered the question that was asked?”
- Wrong units. Minutes vs hours, centimetres vs metres, pounds vs pence.
- Reading difficulty disguised as maths difficulty. If they can solve it when you read it aloud, the obstacle is reading — mention it to the teacher.
Using AI to coach word problems (without solving them)
An AI assistant can walk through the routine with your child, as long as it’s instructed not to solve the problem. Use this with you nearby, and check the AI’s arithmetic — it can make mistakes.
What to ask for: coaching through the four steps — understand, picture, plan, check — one question at a time, with no calculations done for your child.
The AI Tutor Vault includes a dedicated Word Problem Decoder prompt, plus prompts for the step-by-step and wrong-answer moments that follow. See the AI Tutor Vault.
By age
- 5–7: act problems out with toys and objects. Drawing comes next.
- 8–10: introduce drawing every time, including bar models if the school uses them. Two-step problems appear.
- 11–13: multi-step problems with fractions, percentages and ratio. Planning and checking matter most.
- Teens: word problems become algebra — writing an equation from a situation. See how to explain algebra.
Frequently asked questions
Should I teach my child keywords for word problems?
Use them carefully, if at all. Keywords can point in the wrong direction (“more” doesn’t always mean add). Understanding and drawing the situation is more reliable.
My child can do the sums but not the word problems. Why?
Usually the hard part is translating the story into a calculation, not the calculation itself. Practise the “understand” and “picture” steps separately, with easy numbers.
What is a bar model?
A drawing that represents quantities as rectangles, showing how they relate — parts and wholes, or comparisons. Many schools teach it as a standard step for word problems.
How do I help if my child struggles to read the problem?
Read it aloud for them while you work on the maths, and tell the teacher. Reading support and maths support are different needs.
Next steps
Write the four steps — Understand, Picture, Plan, Check — on a card by the homework spot, and ask your child to name the step they’re on. For more coaching questions, see what to say when your child is stuck, and if fractions are involved, how to explain fractions.