For many primary school students in Singapore, the most intimidating part of a math exam isn’t the complex calculations—it’s the page filled with blocks of text. The dreaded word problem. A child might be brilliant at arithmetic, but when faced with a paragraph about people sharing marbles, water flowing into tanks at different rates, or fruits being divided in tricky ways, they freeze. The common cry of “I don’t understand what it’s asking!” is a familiar sound in many households.
This challenge—translating words into a solvable mathematical equation—is one of the biggest hurdles in a child’s math journey. It’s not a lack of math skill, but a gap in a different kind of skill altogether: comprehension, logical reasoning, and the ability to build a mental framework for the problem. Fortunately, this is a skill that can be taught, and it’s where the Sino-Bus Singapore Primary Math Course excels through its targeted 1-to-1 approach.

The Real Hurdle: It’s a Language and Logical Reasoning, Not Just a Math Problem
Imagine being given a book written in a language you only half-understand and being asked to summarize its main point. This is what a word problem can feel like to a child. The difficulty isn’t with the numbers; it’s with the English (or their mother tongue) used to describe the numerical relationship.
Take the example of 9-year-old Liam. He could easily calculate 15 divided by 3. But when the problem was phrased as, “Mr. Tan bought 15 apples and wanted to pack them equally into bags. If each bag holds 3 apples, how many bags does he need?” Liam was stumped. He would randomly add, subtract, or multiply the numbers he saw, hoping to land on the right answer. His parents, seeing that he knew the division fact, were frustrated. “Why can’t he just see it’s division?” they wondered.
The issue lies in several key areas:
Vocabulary Barrier: Words like “altogether,” “remaining,” “shared equally,” “difference,” and “product” have specific mathematical meanings. Children who are still developing their general language skills may not grasp these cues.
Information Overload: A word problem packs a lot of data into a few sentences. Children struggle to filter out the important numbers and relationships from the extra details.
Inability to Visualize: They can’t “see” the story happening in their mind, so they can’t figure out the logical sequence of events.
Fear of the Unknown: A long problem looks scary. This anxiety shuts down their thinking process before they even begin.
The Parent’s Struggle: “But He Knows the Math!”
This situation is particularly frustrating for parents because they can see their child’s underlying capability. Mrs. Lee, Liam’s mother, expressed a common sentiment: “When I draw him a picture or explain it slowly, he gets it immediately. So I know he can do the math. But on his own, he’s lost. I can’t sit with him during his exams.”
The home tutoring session often follows a stressful pattern: the child stares at the problem, the parent waits, the child says “I don’t know,” and the parent eventually breaks down and explains the entire solution. This cycle creates dependency and does nothing to build the child’s own logical reasoning muscles.
The Sino-Bus Framework: Building a Blueprint for Understanding
Sino-Bus addresses this core issue by shifting the focus from “solving the problem” to “understanding the problem.” The 1-to-1 online format is perfect for this, as the tutor can closely observe the child’s thought process and identify exactly where the breakdown occurs.
The methodology is centered around teaching children how to build a framework—a step-by-step blueprint for deconstructing any word problem.
Step 1: The “Detective” Mindset – Finding the Clues
The first goal is to eliminate the fear and turn problem-solving into a game. The tutor encourages the child to become a math detective.
Circle and Box: The child is taught to actively engage with the text by circling the key question (What are they actually asking me to find?) and boxing the key numbers. This simple physical act helps them focus.
Identify the People/Things: “Who or what is this problem about?” Is it about John and Mary? Is it about two tanks of water? Identifying the subjects is the first step to visualizing.
Spot the Action Words: The teacher helps the child create a personal dictionary of action words. “Gave away” means subtract. “Total” means add. “Shared equally” means divide.
Step 2: The “Modeling” Phase – Drawing a Picture of the Problem
This is the most powerful step in the Sino-Bus approach, especially for visual learners. Instead of keeping the problem in their head, children are taught to put it on paper.
Simple Sketches: For young children, this can be as simple as drawing three bags and putting 3 apples in each. The act of drawing makes the abstract problem concrete.
Bar Models: As problems get more complex, tutors introduce the famous Singapore Bar Model method. This visual tool helps children represent relationships between quantities. For example, drawing two bars of different lengths can instantly show the difference between two numbers. Learning to draw these models is like learning to translate English into a universal math language.
Sequential Diagrams: For problems involving sequences (e.g., A gave B some marbles, then B lost some), children learn to draw a simple timeline or flow diagram to track the changes.
Step 3: From Picture to Number Sentence – The “Aha!” Moment
Once the child has built a clear visual model, the tutor guides them to connect the picture back to the numbers.
Guided Questioning: The tutor doesn’t tell; they ask. “Looking at your bar model, what do we need to find out?” “What operation will help us find the total length of this bar?”
Writing the Equation: The child is supported in writing the number sentence (the equation) based on the model they have drawn. This bridges the gap between the story and the math.
Solving with Confidence: Now that the path is clear, the actual calculation becomes the easy part. The child solves the problem with a sense of purpose, not guesswork.
A Story of Success: From Confusion to Clarity
Liam’s journey with his Sino-Bus teacher, Ms. Chen, is a perfect example. In their first session, Ms. Chen gave Liam a word problem and didn’t ask him to solve it. Instead, she asked him to read it and tell her what the story was about. Then, she asked him to draw what he thought was happening.
At first, his drawings were messy and unclear. But Ms. Chen praised every attempt. “Great, you drew Mr. Tan! And are those the apples?” She then gave him a simple framework: “Let’s always start by drawing a box for each person or thing in the problem.”
Within weeks, Liam had a routine. See a word problem -> be a detective -> draw a model. The anxiety was gone because he had a plan. His mother reported that during a school test, she saw him quietly drawing bars on his scrap paper. He came home beaming; he had finally solved a word problem on his own. His confidence soared, not just in logical reasoning, but in his overall ability to tackle tough challenges.
Unlocking a Lifelong Skill
The ability to understand and solve word problems is more than a math skill; it’s a critical thinking skill. It’s about taking a complex situation, breaking it down into manageable parts, and finding a logical solution. This is a skill that applies to science, history, and even everyday life challenges.
The Sino-Bus approach demonstrates that with the right 1-to-1 guidance and a systematic framework, children can move from feeling helpless and confused to feeling empowered and capable. They learn that a block of text is not a monster to be feared, but a puzzle waiting to be solved. By giving them the tools to build their own understanding, we give them the confidence to open any math paper and say, “I know how to figure this out.”
Contact Us WhatsApp:+8618165329059








