In this session we will observe elementary students using self-generated representations to reason about computational patterns that are governed by the behavior of the arithmetic operations. Together we will examine and discuss what can be learned about students’ developing operation sense by looking at their representations. In particular, we will consider how the salience of number and lack of attention to the arithmetic operations can short circuit student reasoning. Questions that bring the action of the operations into focus can help students align their representational, symbolic, and verbal descriptions and support the development of mathematical argument.

Session Type: Discussion Session