Young Filipino students are expected to solve mathematical word problems in English, a language that many encounter only in schools. Using individual interviews of 17 Filipino children, we investigated why word problems in English are difficult and the extent to which the language interferes with performance. Results indicate that children could…

Three theoretical frameworks were used to guide this intervention case study: dividing fractions; sociomathematical norms, and justification. Middle school mathematics students were given the opportunity to solve partitive and measurement division of fraction word problems with different contexts. The teacher purposefully implemented a…

Newman (1977, 1983) defined five specific literacy and numeracy skills as crucial to performance on mathematical word problems: reading, comprehension, transformation, process skills, and encoding. Newman's Error Analysis (NEA) provided a framework for considering the reasons that underlay the difficulties students experienced with mathematical…

This paper reports the results from a study which explored the influence of condition (access to four-function calculator, access to graphing calculator with instructional exposure, and access to graphing calculator without instructional exposure) on the mathematical performance of students with and without a disability. The results were analyzed…

This study examines presentations of the distributive property (DP) in two widely used U.S. elementary text series and one main Chinese text series along three dimensions: problem contexts, typical problem types within each problem context, and variability in using the DP. In general, the two U.S. texts were found to resemble each other but to…

Two aspects of mathematics with which students with mathematics learning difficulty (MLD) often struggle are word problems and number-combination skills. This article describes a math program in which students receive instruction on using algebraic equations to represent the underlying problem structure for three word-problem types. Students also…

Contributions of domain-general and domain-specific numerical competencies were assessed on first graders' number combination skill (NC) and word-problem skill (WP). Students (n = 205) between 5 and 7 years of age were assessed on 2 aspects of numerosity, 8 domain-general abilities, NC, and WP. Both aspects of numerosity predicted NC when…

Teachers are often at a loss when considering how to address mathematics difficulties for students with high functioning autism/Asperger's syndrome (HFA/AS). Students may show difficulty remembering operations throughout an equation, organizing information on the page, and comprehending the language in instructions of word problems. These…

The purpose of this article is to discuss curriculum-based measurement (CBM) as it is currently utilized in research and practice and to propose a new approach for developing measures to monitor the academic progress of students longitudinally. To accomplish this, we first describe CBM and provide several exemplars of CBM in reading and…

This research study, carried out in South Africa and the United States of America, investigated issues that may hamper prospective primary school teachers from writing acceptable problem posing scenarios involving the addition of fractions. Pre-service teachers (n=44) were asked to compose real life problems involving the addition of two fractions…

Reciprocal teaching, a social constructivist instruction method, was explored in this study on the mathematical word problem solving skills of fifth grade students in two elementary schools within a suburban school district in upstate New York. Eighty-five students in four intact classes participated in this mixed methods study. Using a…

This study investigated the effectiveness of an instructional program (schema-based instruction, SBI) designed to teach 7th graders how to comprehend and solve proportion problems involving ratios/rates, scale drawings, and percents. The SBI program emphasized the underlying mathematical structure of problems via schematic diagrams, focused on a…

The role of working memory (WM) in children's growth in mathematical problem solving was examined in a longitudinal study of children (N = 127). A battery of tests was administered that assessed problem solving, achievement, WM, and cognitive processing (inhibition, speed, phonological coding) in Grade 1 children, with follow-up testing in Grades…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of a computer-based story on sixth grade students' mathematics word problem solving achievement. Problems were embedded in a story presented on a computer, and then compared to a paper-based story and to a condition that presented the problems as typical, isolated words problems. One hundred…

This paper reports on the potential roles and importance of electrooculography (EOG) for mathematics educational neuroscience research. EOG enables accurate measurements of eye-related behavior (i.e., blinks & movements) by recording changes in voltage potentials generated by eye-related behavior. We identify and discuss three main uses of EOG.…