As elementary students begin to program using tangible blocks, they must coordinate their use of counting with the movements, directions, and numbers they use to move a character. In our study, we analyzed 13 first graders' first attempts at coordinating these elements when playing a programming game on the iPad that used tangible programming…

This research project focuses on identifying the difficulties that children between 6-7 years-old have in learning natural numbers, when working a teaching model with a Von Neumann formal mathematical basis. In this study, we present the analysis of the experimentation with a first-grade class in the construction of zero and one numbers,…

Drawing on research around the utility of worked examples, we examine how 29 first- and 27 third-grade students made sense of integer subtraction worked examples and used those examples to solve similar problems. Students first chose which of three worked examples correctly represented an integer subtraction problem and used the example to solve a…

Symmetric objects are known to be perceived easier than asymmetric objects, because less information has to be processed. Therefore, symmetric objects are often used for spatial tasks. However, in perspective-taking the use of symmetric objects can also cause difficulties, as two side-views of these objects are mirror-images of each other. To…