The goal of this study was to describe fraction-calculation errors among fourth-grade students and to determine whether error patterns differed as a function of ...

A year after he started his Ph.D. in mathematics at McGill University, Matt Bowen had a problem. “I took my qualifying exams and did absolutely horribly on them,” he said. Bowen was sure that his ...

Fractions are the basis for most higher-level mathematics. Students need to master the numerical values in earlier grades to tackle topics like algebra later. There’s only one hitch: Fractions can ...

Want to learn more? Sign up for a free five-week email mini-course full of research-backed strategies to help students make sense of math. Fractions are an important building block in students’ ...

Fractions, often perceived as daunting, become manageable with the right approach. Addition and subtraction require finding a common denominator, while multiplication involves directly multiplying ...

Many children never master fractions. When asked whether 12/13 + 7/8 was closest to 1, 2, 19, or 21, only 24% of a nationally representative sample of more than 20,000 US 8th graders answered ...

On his website andertoons.com, illustrator Mark Anderson has a cartoon in which a boy is handing his teacher an assignment. “To show how well I understand fractions,” he says, “I only did half of my ...

Fractions are enough to make you cry if you’re not a math whiz, but Microsoft Excel handles them very well. In fourth-grade math, you learned fraction basics: Fractions are a numerical representation ...

Despite the existence of the metric system and an increased reliance in recent years on decimal fractions to write partial amounts (such as 2.5), we often find ourselves wanting to drop in a true ...