Stability and change in children's division strategies
Katherine M Robinson1, Katherine D Arbuthnott, Danica Rose
1Department of Psychology, University of Regina, Regina, Sask., Canada S4S 0A2. katherine.robinson@uregina.ca
Journal of Experimental Child Psychology
|October 26, 2005
Summary
Children
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Development
- Educational Psychology
- Mathematics Education
Background:
- Children's arithmetic skills develop with age.
- Understanding the development of mathematical strategies is crucial for effective pedagogy.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate age-related changes in children's performance on simple division problems.
- To examine strategy use and its development in solving division problems across grades.
Main Methods:
- Children in Grades 4 through 7 solved 32 simple division problems.
- Performance metrics included speed and accuracy.
- Strategy use (addition, multiplication, direct retrieval) was analyzed.
Main Results:
- Older children (Grades 5-7) were faster and more accurate than younger children (Grade 4).
- Performance improved with smaller problem sizes.
- Strategy shifted from "addition" to "multiplication" with age, but direct retrieval did not increase.
Conclusions:
- Division appears to be a unique arithmetic operation with distinct developmental patterns.
- Understanding these patterns can inform the teaching of procedural and conceptual arithmetic knowledge.
- Direct retrieval from memory for division facts may develop differently than for other operations.
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