Difficulties with Decimals And Using Everyday Knowledge to Overcome Them Kay C.

Irwin University of Auckland Most children have trouble understanding decimals. They confuse them with whole numbers or with fractions. They find it very difficult to understand decimal fractions as an extension of place value as used for ones, tens, hundreds, and thousands. The research on Teachers Raising Achievement in Mathematics (TRAM) in Auckland showed that children who came from low decile schools had considerably more difficulty with decimals that did children from higher decile schools. When we learned this, we looked both for possible explanations for this difference, and for a way to overcome the difficulty that these children from lower decile schools were having. One possibility was that these children had different experiences outside school than did children from upper decile schools, and that a teaching approach based more on their experience would help them to understand decimals better. What do children know about decimals from their experience outside school? Children come across decimals informally long before they are taught about them in school. I interviewed 84 students from lower decile schools, to see what they already knew about decimals. One group of 8-year-old New Zealand students were able to describe seeing numbers with a dot in them in sports statistics, on hospital charts, in shops, on a cheque, in the bank, on a calculator, in books, on a 1.5 litre bottle of soft drink, and as a monitoring position on a racing car course where one child stood with his Dad. Interestingly, when children of 10 or 12 were interviewed, they thought of a narrower range of places where decimals were seen. These were mostly in school, or in money, a setting which teachers often use to help children understand decimals. It was not until age 14, when decimals were no longer being formally taught, that the students came up with a wide variety of places where they saw decimals outside

school. School experience and out-of-school experience were not well integrated by children being taught about decimals.

By the time they are formally taught about decimals in school, students also have a pretty good understanding of the system for whole numbers. They know that numbers can be used for calculation without references to what these numbers might stand for in situations like stores, hospitals, banks, or labels on soft drink bottles. They usually know how to write and read numbers in the hundreds and thousands. They also know something about common fractions. They know various shortcuts for calculating with numbers, like the algorithms based on regrouping for addition and subtraction, and adding a zero for multiplying a number by 10. They bring a wealth of concepts about whole numbers that they then apply in their attempt to understand decimals.

Many of these concepts do not work for decimals. This leads to confusions students have difficulty overcoming. In fact, it would be most unusual for a child who thinks about numbers in a logical way not to have some of these confusions. What are some of their confusions? Among the ideas that are appropriate for whole numbers and dont make sense with decimals are the following: A longer number is bigger. 134 is bigger than 34, so 0.134 must be bigger than 0.34 Putting a zero on the end of a number makes it 10 times as large. 150 is 10 times as large as 15, so 1.50 must be 10 times as large as 1.5 A fraction with a bigger number on the bottom is smaller than one with a smaller number on the bottom is smaller than so 0.4 must be smaller than 0.2 Putting 0s at the front of a whole number doesnt matter 023 is the same as 23 so 0.023 must be the same as 23 or 0.23 When you add numbers you add like with like If 9 and 1 = 10, then, 0.9 and 0.1 must equal 0.10 Numbers are for things that you can count

so no numbers can come between 0 and 1 Decimals are a decorative dot separating two different numbers (Swans term). If you do something to one side you should also do it to the other side so 4.3 + 1 = 5.4, or 1.5 x 10 = 10.50 Other misconceptions relate to knowing that decimals are different from whole numbers, but being uncertain about how they differ. For example: In place value, numbers get bigger as they go to the left. In decimals they get smaller after the decimal point. They see the numbers balanced around the decimal point. The system is balanced so it has hundreds, tens, ones, the decimal point, oneths, tenths, hundredths

Students are quite creative in their explanations. One boy, aged 11, used a combination of his understanding of place value with his understanding of a number line in the following explanation.

I. Up here we got an answer called zero point one, what does that mean to you? C. Thats the middle of the two, it goes one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight and like that, the other one that goes like one two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, I. Write that down for me, so I can see what you mean. C. (writes starting from the right of the decimal point:) 43210.01234 I. What about zero point zero one, what does that mean? C. The zero is the middle to zero and tens. So it would go, zero, it would go ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty that way and it would go ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty that way. I Write that down. C. (writes) 50 40 30 20 10 . 10 20 30 40 50

It is most unlikely that anyone had taught this concept to this boy. He had thought up this rationale by himself, and a year later was heard to give a similar explanation to a classmate. His misconception, like those above, could only be shifted when he saw that it did not fit with other things about decimals (for example, that there were no oneths). All of the misconceptions given above are logical. They demonstrate that children are thinking about numbers and construct these ideas on the base of their previous experience. In the terms used by Piaget and other theorists, they have developed schemas for numbers and how they work and attempt to fit decimals into these existing schemas. It is no wonder, therefore, that misconceptions are difficult to overcome. Using context to overcome misconceptions The approach used in my study, to help Year 7 and 8 students overcome these inappropriate associations, was to find ways of showing that something that these students from a lower decile school already knew is in conflict with these explanations that they have developed for decimals. Writers like Inhelder have called this creating cognitive conflict. Tapping back into the knowledge that children have of decimals in everyday settings can help them see the error in their misconceptions. Most teachers use everyday settings to some extent through the use of money or sports statistics. This may be a good first step. However, for many students, these contexts are not enough to overcome some of the misconceptions mentioned above. Money and most sports statistics are given to the same number of decimal places. This allows students to deal with them in the same way in which the deal with whole numbers. They can be lined up to see which is the biggest or smallest in the same way that whole numbers are. They can be added if you line up the decimal point. You can deal with them as though there were no decimal point and then put the point in at the right place in the answer. This type of context familiarises students with the use of a decimal point, but may help them to believe more strongly that numbers with decimal in them work just like whole numbers.

Another common way of introducing students to decimals is to use their rulers, which show divisions of centimetres into tenths. This is useful for helping students to see that decimal numbers come between whole numbers. However, the move from understanding tenths to understanding hundredths is made more difficult by the fact that, as one student said, Centimetres are on one side of the ruler, and millimetres are on the other side, going the other way. Their relationship is not self-evident. Connections to more complicated everyday uses of decimals may be needed for students to face the misconceptions that they have developed. It may also be necessary for students to discuss or argue about the accuracy of an answer. The major study behind this article involved two groups of students from one Year 7 and 8 class, in a lower decile school, working on problems that included decimals. Half of the class worked, in pairs, on problems that included the use of these more challenging everyday uses of decimals. The other half of the class worked on similar problems that did not include contexts. The contextualised problems made an important difference for the group of students who were asked to discuss them, in pairs, and decide upon an answer that both students agreed on. The students who worked on problems given in complex contexts made significantly more progress on a post test than did students who had worked on similar problems without contexts [F(1,12)=5.70, p=.03]. Problems were written using two criteria. One criterion was that they used some slightly unusual everyday context for decimals that the students would have to think about. The other criterion was that they were expected to challenge common misconceptions held by this group of children. Some of the problems involved the use different metric units. These problems could be solved either with decimal equivalents or by translating the larger unit into a multiple of the smaller. Students appeared to increase their understanding with the use of either of these methods.

Working in pairs was an important part of the research design. Students were asked to either to compare and explain the logic of two hypothetical students who got different answers or to estimate what the answer would be and then work the problem out on a calculator. They needed to come to agreement. Often there was conflict between the explanations or the logic of the two students in the pair. Examples of the problems used for the confusions addressed, were: (i) Problem on length of numeral versus magnitude: (a) A soft drink like coke comes in different sizes. One is 1.5 litres and another is 355 ml. John said that the 355 was bigger because 355 is a larger number. Is he right? Why or why not? Amoura says that the 1.5 litre was bigger because it was a bigger bottle. Is she right? Why or why not? What do you think? (b) Is there more soft drink in a 2 litre bottle or in a 6-pack of 355 ml cans? Estimate it, work it out Check it on your calculator ii) Problem involving how 0s work in decimals: (a) Mark subtracted $1.15 from $1.65 on his calculator His calculator said .5 He thought his calculator must be broken because he was sure he should have more than 5 cents. Does your calculator give the same answer? What was the problem? (b) If $NZ 1 exchanges for .8544 Australian, you much will you get for $NZ10? (c) Louise is going to make elastics for French skipping. Each one takes 2.3 metres and she needs to make 10. She multiplied to see how much she needed to buy. She got 20.30 metres. How did she get that? Was she right? When she went to the store they multiplied it on their calculator and said she needed 23 metres. Why did they get that? Why was one of the answers wrong? What is the right answer?

(d) A big block of cheese weighs 4 kilos. If it is divided among 100 children at a camp, how much would each child get? Estimate it, work it out Try it on your calculator (iii) Problem that challenges children to think about the relation of decimals and whole numbers in unusual contexts: (a) If you go on a trip, and spend 78.9 cents on a litre of petrol, and $4.95 on a meal at McDonalds, how much would you have spent? (b) The exchange rate between New Zealand dollars and Samoan tala is 1.5429. Thomas said that that meant that you got 154 tala and 29 cents for every New Zealand dollar. Why did he say that? Do you agree? 'Evaline said that you would get 1 tala and 54 cents for every New Zealand dollar. Why did she say that? Is she right? What do you think? Since the children worked in pairs, it was possible to tape-record their discussion as they worked out these problems. There were often arguments between one child who wanted to work with the numbers themselves, and the other child who held to the sense of the problem. Interestingly it was usually the students who were less competent, mathematically, who used commonsense to overcome numerical misconceptions. One such dialogue related to the question: If you go on a trip, and spend 90 .9 cents [the price at the time] on a litre of petrol, and $4.95 on a meal at McDonalds, how much would you have spent? M Ninety-five dollars about, something cents... four cents. N Or five dollars.. cus its the whole thing. M Yeah I know, ninety-five dollars and something cents. Probably about ninety-five dollars and four cents. N Wheres the petrol? M Thats how much it costs all together isnt it? N Ninety-five dollars? ... for a McDonald's and petrol? M Yeah (laugh) oh. ... N Five dollars, six dollars... six dollars point eight, no point, no six dollars five... uh six dollars five cents point nine.

M Six dollars five cents point nine? N Yeah. M Point nine? (Pause) six dollars and five cents point nine. N Yeah. M That means six point five point nine. N Oh man nah... ... [M suggest that they round 90.9 to 99] (when about to use the calculator) M I have a weird feeling about this. I think its going to come out as ninety-five dollars and something. N (writes) 4.95 + 90.9 =95.85 ... N 4 point ninety five plus ninety nine cents. M Four point ninety five plus \ N Ninety-nine cents. ... Ooh. (N enters 495+99= on the calculator) M How did we get? N Um I didnt put the point. Would these problems help every student? These problems and others like them helped this particular group of students get a better understanding of decimals, because they brought their existing misconceptions and their everyday knowledge into conflict. As they argued through this conflict they came to a better idea of how decimals worked. Some of these discussions were lengthy up to 6 single-spaced pages of transcript for one problem. For example, in response to the problem about division of a 4 kilo block of cheese, students argued through whether the answer would be 25 grams, because 100 divided by 4 was 25, or 4 grams, because 4 divided by 100 was .04. At different times in the discussion they persuaded themselves that either answer could be correct. The issue that they had to resolve was whether you could divide 4 by 100. This was a more complex version of the problem of deciding whether there could be numbers between 0 and 1. The problems appeared to help students overcome misconceptions because the contexts used were familiar enough for students to realise when an answer was obviously wrong. Different problems might need to be written for other students. For example, this group included students whose families had experience with currency exchange because they either travelled or sent money back to Pacific Island nations.

Similar problems would not be meaningful to students who had no experience with currency exchange. Other successful teaching procedures for decimals There have been other programs that were successful in helping students understand decimals. One, developed by Hiebert and Wearne in the United States, uses place value blocks with the large block being used as the unit, the flat as the tenths, etc. This method is demonstrated in MSM 31. Some New Zealand children have difficulty with this model because they have used these blocks extensively for whole numbers. Another program was developed by Malcolm Swan while he was at the Shell Centre. This emphasised placement of decimals on number lines, so that it was clear, for example, that 1.85 came between 1.8 and 1.9. He found that the conflict between students misconceptions and the number line was important for learning. A study on Teaching Decimals that is now in progress in Auckland suggests that different methods of instruction are appropriate for different stages of understanding of decimals. Fourteen classes have been assessed to date. In this project, teachers of years 5 and 6 and 7 and 8, from different schools, used a common pretest and posttest that covers several levels of understanding. For analysis, classes were grouped by their pretest scores. In the group that started with children who knew very little about decimals, the most progress was made by a teacher who worked only on tenths. She used models that enabled children to visualise tenths, using chocolate, the number line, fraction pictures (as in YAM 4, p. 313) grids and calculator work with fraction equivalents (1/2 = 0.5). She did very little exploration of decimal numbers without models that demonstrated their meaning. By keeping instruction at a level suitable for the children, she advanced their understanding. The teacher in the project who made the most progress worked with a group who had some initial understanding of decimals. He based his teaching heavily on the number

Judith, I dont have the book here. It is one of the little red books put out by the Department of Education some years back. Can you get someone to find the reference?

line, although he was unfamiliar with the work of Swan. He gave a variety of problems, but asked his students always to refer back to the number line. The problems given above would be most successful for a group, like those studied, who had an initial understanding of tenths and hundredths and were beginning to carry out operations with them. It is likely that students at this stage will have developed common misconceptions in the process of their learning. A challenging assessment for children of this level is that from the English Assessment Performance Unit. Items from this test were used to assess progress of the students. It presents item horizontally, for example 12.5 5.75, and asks students to estimate the answer. This type of problem is a good test of students number sense for decimals. Why is place value in decimals hard to learn? The major shift that students need to make in order to understand decimals as opposed to whole numbers, is that decimals are always the result of a division. To use tenths, a student needs to realise that a single unit is being divided into 10 equal sized pieces. Similarly, 100ths are the result of equal division into 100 parts. The decimal 0.1 is said as one tenth, but the fact that it is one tenth of one is not said; it is assumed. Educators often bemoan the fact that children dont understand place value, and therefore cant understand decimals. However, place value can be understood at different levels. When working with whole numbers, it can be seen as an overflow procedure. As on an abacus, when you go from 9 to 10 you have to use another column. A similar shift happens when 1 is added to 99 and the answer takes three digits to write. Students can learn to name the value of the different columns. It is not necessary for students to know that tens column is 10 times as large as the units column, and the tens column is one hundredth as large as the thousands column in order to work with whole numbers. Yet in order for students to really understand decimals they must have this more complicated understanding. This more complex use of the place value system was not used in the west until the sixteenth century, according to Streefland. It would be an unusual child who came to this same realisation at the age when they are first introduced to decimals in school,

even if they were told. It requires what is called multiplicative thinking, which is more difficult than the additive thinking that they have used previously. It requires a major change in childrens schema. It is like changing gears, yet children do not realise that this major shift is needed. Teaching which enables students to transfer some of their whole number logic, which is largely additive, helps the introduction of decimals and usually carries them as far as an understanding of tenths. A full understanding of decimals will come more gradually, and involve facing ideas that conflict with what they know about numbers. It is helpful for teachers to know how complex this shift in students thinking can be. There are many ways of helping them with this shift. The use of problems in which everyday uses of decimals conflict with common misconceptions is one very useful method, because it forces students to make use of their everyday knowledge. It provides a method of checking what may have become a meaningless manipulation of numbers. As in other spheres, knowledge is driven by existing knowledge (Glaser 1986). If we ignore students everyday knowledge we do not help them to use this existing knowledge in mastery of new knowledge. References: Alexopoulos, N., Bartram, A., Clark, B., McIntosh, A., & Robinson, I. (1991). Young Australian Maths, Level 4: Teachers Guide. Melbourne: Nelson. Britt, M. S., Irwin, K. C., Ellis, J., and Ritchie, G. (1993). Teachers raising achievement in mathematics: Report to the Ministry of Education. Auckland NZ: Auckland College of Education. Glaser, R. (1984). Education and thinking. American Psychologist, 39, 93-104. Inhelder, B., Sinclair, H & Bovet, M. (1974). Learning and the development of cognition. London: Rutledge & Kegan Paul. Irwin, K. C. (1997). Using context to enhance students understanding of decimal fractions. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Auckland, Auckland, NZ Irwin, K. C. (in press). Teaching Decimals in Three Auckland Schools, New Zealand Mathematics Magazine. Mason, K., & Ruddock, G. (1986). Decimals: Assessment at age 11 and 15. Windsor: NFER-Nelson. Streefland, L. (1991). Fractions in realistic mathematics education: A paradigm of developmental research. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Swan, M. (1983). Teaching decimal place value: A comparative study of conflict and positive only approaches. Nottingham UK: Shell Centre for Mathematical Education, Nottingham University.

Wearne, D., & Hiebert, J. (1988). Constructing and using meaning for mathematical symbols: The case of decimal fractions. In M. Behr & J. Hiebert (Eds.), Number concepts and operations in the middle grades (pp. 220-235). Hillsdale NJ: Erlbaum.