ffi:

,ourntl lilr Rcscxrch in Mathcnratic$ Educnti()n

2U)-5.

Vol. 36, No. l,44_71

(itnt<'lit t'd't l)urtan' r'clra utn <rcn Brorn-snijtlars, atd M<,ittdert

B<,isrruize rr

45

Progressive Mathe matization tong Division Strategies -

of

in Dutch primary
Le

Sch--ools

Cornelis M. van putten iden Univers ity, The N etherlands

,,u,u,1,iT,i;Jii1i,iiff ,ir"r,,0, ,'li)ff

Meindert Beishuizen
l"eide n U nive rs ity, The N e the rlands Students' str,ategies

for solving long-division problems under a realistic inathematics approach (RME) at Dutch prim-ary rin*rr *"G in two *uyrl iul-u".o.oing to the level of how sturrents "ut"gorizea cre.r,io *ritipr"r airiso.lct unking) to be subtracred from the dividend; and (b) according;-,#;;;;;".nusq "ii.e of schematic notation. These categories courd be ouantified oni*o ai."rrion., ur" ofschematization and use of number relations. Jusi after th" intrJu.tioooilo-ng aivision probrems, students, shate_ gies varied from no-chunkin!," rtrgt -r"""i"i;;l*"g. Five months later, this variarion -*"r"iy of strategies was reduced t t iltr-r"rJi'lt urr*i"g using a scheme. However, sfategy develooment depended on stud;;, ;rerequisite knowledge and the rype of texr_ book used' The resurts from this study contribute to the efficacy of RM^E for the advancement of strategies
ura u.t

i"u"ii"r, irim" o"*"in

of division.

the 1983 National Assessment of Ecrucational progress (cf. Silver et ar., 1993): ..An army bus holds 36 soldiers. If I r 2g soldiers , are being bused to a trainingirir", rro* many buses are needed?" Figure l (translated from the original in Treffers, 1991, p. 23) shows three solutions to this probrem, each of which foflow the scheme of repeated subtraction of multipres of the divisor from the dividend. Figure ra shows an extended solution based on multiples of l0; Figures lb and rc are more abbreviated (i.e., shorter and pgrhaps more efficient) because of the use of rarger rnultiples such as 20 and 30. problems similar to the bus problem

tion and, division have also been in'estigated from a rongitiidinai p"..p..tiu. (Ambrose, Baek, & Carpenrer,2003; Clark & Kamii. 1996; Iriulligan & Mitchelmore, 1997: Van punen & ff rnr, f SSil. In the 1980s, the case of long division, which has been a srumbring block in the area of algorithmic proc-edures for many students (cf. Silver, shapiro, & Deutsch, 1993), was used by the Dutch (cf- Dekker, Ter Heege, & Treffers, l9g2) to demonstrate how an informal arternative approach might be a better choice in school prac_ tice. Treffers (1987) advocated a aiiactrc apploach, cafied progressive schenmti_ zalion, consisting of two important characteistics. First, schematic notation and stepwise abbreviation were added to the informal strategy of repeated subtraction of the divisor from the dividend for solving long division problems. Second, concrete contexts were used for long division problems in order to invite studerts to try first their availabre preknowledge and lnformal strategies. A weil-known example of long division in a concrete context is the ..bus proble=m" originating from

Bcishuizen' & Tref'fers, l99g). Rece.tly, more cornprex strategies for nr*rtiprica_

were

Key words: Achievemenq caregoricar data; children's strategies; rongitudinar studies: Multiplication/division; rtr"rtii*irt" t*t iriqid'n"rorrn in matheniatics educarion; Subtraction 1.128 soldie.rs are

irseiin many

una"rrt*oing of formal Bauersfeld, 1gg5; FennJma, et ,1., 1996; Ruthven, 1998j. Important questions arising from this claim involve what the development of students' informat irrto for-airt utegies will look like in reration to their marhemarical knowredge *d h* ;;l deveropmenr is affected. by the didactic approach. This deveropireot t ir.u" rr", been investigated in an increasing number of longitudinal studies that have focused on *re aevJtop***i r,ua"rrr, elementary addition and zubtraction rt ut"gi"s based on numbers up to 100 (Carpenter, Franke, Jacobs, Fennem4 &;fi;-;, l99g; Fuson, et al.,

a new teaching upprou".f, th"t contributes to strategies (Becker & serrer, tg-go; couo

In mathematics education, building on students' informal strategies has been recognized as

transported on buses that have 36 seats. How many buses are needed?
361 l1 zB \

&

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1997; Klein,

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Figure

(b.)

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grareful for thehelpful.comments provided by several unonr*ou. revrewers on earrier drafts of thii article. w" rr. rppili;rir;ffiJ tance provided by Edward A""poiully silu"r, vilmu preparation ofthis article for publication

*" -^-)-I:

I'

Levels of orosressive schematization of informal long division strategies in

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rrerrers i[ffi:l.H"1:T"ilil'.xil:::r;t:X,',i*.-."*ro,r,i*,,yeaucation...byA (p..23)inReatistic Mathemitics id;;;;"^';;;;;,til7Jrr,.ai,.a uy L. streefland. 199 r, urrchi, The

Netherlands: Freudenthal lnstitute. permission.

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Freudenthal Instirute. Reprinted with

46

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Srrale_gre.s

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Dutch publications to illustrate the so-called realistic nTathenntics education (RME) approach of gradual strategy development starting from realistic problem contexts and students' informal strategies. other aspects of RME are whole-class
discussion of different solutions for the same problem. These discussions encourage differences between students regarding their final solution and the solution method, thereby not stressing a standard algorithm (Gravemeijer, I 997; Treffers, 199 l, 1993 ; Treffers & Beishuizen, 1999). In most Dutch primary schools this is now the basic approach not ohly to long division but also to arithmetic in general, because since the 1990s, teaching methods and textbooks in the Netherlands have adopted these

students' stlategy use ()vcr ir sct ()l'problettts. l11 this corltext, a comparisr.rn wirs tttade between two types ol'ltME textbooks to investigate tl.re effects o[ more vcrsus lcss emphasis on a preslructuring of the students' solutions. We also tnade a cotrlparison betweeh mathernatics level subgroups of str-onger and weaker students: the type of strategies they pret'erred, tl.reir strategy development, and their achievement on the divisi6n tests. We provide details on these aspects of our research in the sections

of the article that follow.

'

RME didactic principles. Also in the united Kingdom we have seen a growing interest in informal strategies and contextual arithmetic. For example, the National Numeracy Strategy (NNs) (Department for Educarion and Employmenr [DfEE], 1999) introduced a change toward emphasizing mental calculation strategies in the lower grades, but, in contrast to Dutch RME, the changes appeared only to postpone the introduction of standard written algorithms. In a DfEE discussion paper (school cuniculum and Assessment Authority [scAA], 1997), the RME long division example of progressive schematizztion was mentioned as a possible alternative and was later introduced

BACKGROUND
Earlier research (Greer, 1992; Mutligan & Mitchelmore, 19971Neuman, 1999)
has documented the

intuitive, informal strategies that students use when they are

in the NNS-framework for Years (i.e., Grades) 4, 5, and 6. Considering these similarities (attention to informal strategies) and differences
(inclusion or noninclusion of standard algorithms) in the didactic approach to leaming arithmetic procedures, research cooperation between Cambridge (uK) and Leiden

& Anghileri,

(rhe Netherlands [Nt]) (Anghileri,200lb; Anghileri & Beishrrizen, 1998; Beishuizen 1998) led to a comparative study on loug division strategies in 20

schools, 10 in carnbridge and l0 in Leiden, with a similar student population. In both countries, the inroduction of simple long division takes place in Grade 3, with the problems involving small division presented as reversals of the multiplication problems in the multiplication tables up to 10. This compararive study focused on the further development of shategies for more complex long division problems with dividends above 100 and divisors between l0 and 20 in Grade 4, specifically, the extension of informal sfiategies into algorithmic procedures (UK) compared to the progressive schematization of informal strategies (M-). outcomes of this comparative study (Anghileri, Beishuizen, & van putten, 2002) point to a low level of achieyement and little improvement for the traditional algorithms in British classrooms (for the uK resBlts, see Anghileri ,z,oola,2001b), whereas the Dutch students showed progress in achievement as well as in schematization when using their informal strategies. The purpose of this afiiale is to provide a detailed analysis of the Dutch data (Snijders, 1998) concerning the development of students' strategies from informal strategies to a further sc hematization orfonralizatioz of procedures for long division. In order to describe the variety and correspondence of the long division strdtegies, we used a multivariate statistical technique called HoMALS (HoMogeneity analysis by Alternating least squares). This technique rnade it possible to move from the level of solutions seen in separate division problems to the level of analysis of

initially-that is, before they learn the division atgorithm. The approach that we used in the study reported here is comparable to that of Mulligan and Mitchelmore (1997), who carried out a longitudinal study within the context of the Australian mathematics curriculum in Grades 2 and 3. Their focus was on strategy development, and they observed mostly informal strategies (e.g., direct counting, repeated subtraction, and repeated addition) in Grade 2, with students' use of more efficient multiplicative operations beginning to appear by Grade 3. The move toward more efficient operations in strategy development was attribuied to the mathematics curriculum, which emphasized the multiplication tables in Grade 3-a situation that is about the same as in Britain and the Netherlands. Thus, our research might therefore be considered a follow-up study to that of Mulligan and Mitchelmore (1997),,because we expected among our Grade 4 students an increased use of multiplication facts and multiplicative operpresented with division problems

ations for the long division strategies based on the mathematics curriculum. Use of these multiplication facts plays an important role in the aforementioned progressive schematization app.ouoh to informal long division strategies (Treffers, 1987)-in particular the lO-rule that suggests starting, if possible, by subtracting 10 times the divisor from the dividend. Emphasis is also placed on schematization or further formalization of the informal calculation procedure. All examples in Figure I show the vertical scheme of repea-ted subtraction of multiples of the

divisor from the dividend and the parallel notation of those multiples, which Treffers presented as a kind of "column arithmetic," with a format quite comparable to that used in traditional arithmetic (p. 125). Current discussions in Britain point to ihformal, mental strategies as relevant but privhte and varying roads to
understanding, which are not expected to lead to more general and efficient arithrnetic procedures. Treffers' schematizatiqn of solutions based upon informal strategies might be an adequate answer to these objections (Kiichemann, 1999; Straker, iqgq). It is interesting to note that Ruthven (1998), in an evaluation of students' work with informal mental and calculator strategies, under{ines similar functions of (not too messy) scrap paper work: "It can augment working memory by recording qtising key items of information [and] it can cue sequences of actions through schem (p. 31). such information within a standard spatial configuration"

ffi{.'

:l

ti

Lrnt g

Divisiott Strat egies

Cornelis van Putten, Petra von den Bron-Snijder.s, euul Meindcrt l]eislrui:<,rt

-l (.i

(Treffers & Beishuizen,

i:"t^i*

didactic principle of interactive whole-class teaching with discussion of several solutlre-same problem fostering further J"u"lopm"rt of students, srraregies

lever. Therefore, the model in Figure r can aiso serve trre purpose of differentiation among students within the crassroom. Another practical argument offered by Treffers (19s7) was that a crass courd be given trre same probrem, with students working out the problem at different levers."we recognize here the important RME

need to attain this highest rever, and

final solution level. Figure lc gives an optimar murtipre of the divisor (30 rimes) in the first subtracrion step. According to Treffers (tigz, p. wl,roiutt ,toa"nt,

abbreviates the soru_ comgargd ro repeared subtraction of 36, or 72 (2 timesthe divisor), or lg0 1i-o1 (5 times the divisor), as might be the case in an earlier phase of strategy development' For some children, the apprication of this r0-rule might indicatl their finar solution level. Figure lb shows a further abbreviation of the solution by directly s-ubfacf nq a 2o-murtipre of the divisor. ror u ffi"migtrt ue trreir

Treffers & Beishuizen, I999). Figure I presents amoder for strategy development arong severar levers ofabbreviation of the solution. In Figure la"the l0-rure is appried to the divisor of 36, resulting in an initiar subtracti,on of 360, which considliably

the afore_ ntentioned progressive schematization course, but he also emphasized other characteristics of informal strategies such as mental calculation, fleiibre arithmetic, and estimation, in order "to combar an,attitude that f;;;;;;i;rtr"ly;;. . . column arithnretic.according to the rules" (p. r35). Recently the wider termprogressive mathenmtization has been emproyei wittrin the RME approach (Treffers, 1997;

For Treffers (1987), schematization was not the onry argument in

432 children have to be transported by 15 seater buses. How many buses will be needed?

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RESEARCHGOALS
The first goal of the study reported here was to give a systematic description

of

Figure 2 .Exanples of students' solutions showing different levels of chunking and schematization.
Note. These examples are from the tests developed for this study.

:.ll :l:because Ievel"

than those shown in Treffers' (r9g7) publication, which focused strongly on the use of the.r0-rure. The exampies shown in Figure I are typicar of the.strategies that emerge in the second harf of Craoe + after many ressons of interactive teaching. students, however, usuaily start bytrying ,o o"il" ro"g division problems with lower level strategie.s trrat invotve eraborating on their preknowledge. Figure 2 shows examples of such rower rever strategies provided by students half way into their Grade 4 year,.but before they receiied i".*"ti", i, p.ogr"r.iu" schematization taught according to the didactic moder. The probrem also im,olved a bus situation. Figure 2a ilrusiates the scheme of repeated subtraction, but this example begins with subtraction of just the divisor t5 and tr,", p.og."rr", to subtraction of 3 times the divisor (notile the auxiliary addition to arrive at 45). we
strategy

fr"#ffiJi; of strategies

organized schematic fashion. Figure 2b shows a low-level repeated addition strategy with doublings of the divisor (30), progressively increasing to additions of 8 times the divisor (15 x 8 = 120). Finally, Figure 2c shows an application of the l0-rule with schematization, an advanced strategy we called high-level chunking with a scheme, a strategy that some of the Grade 4 students already demonstrated during the first test occasion and before instruction. A distinction between solution strategies with or without the scheme of repeated subtraction was not made in Anghileri

inFigure2alo*-irr"t prog,r"rrive chunking with a schcme_,low it resulted i, a very roni rir't oi ruut utions that were written in an

et al.'s (2002) global comparison of the Dutch with the English results, but it is cnrcial for the interpretation of the development of the Dutch students. ,l Our second research goal reflects the longitudinal design of our study. In particular, we designed the study to give a detailed description of the Cevelopment of

hng

D i v i s i<n Srrare.gies

Conrciis vo,t Putten, Petra van den Bron-Snijtlers, and Meinclert Beishui:en

-sl

strategy use during Grade 4 between two testing occasions: tlre first test -qiven at the halfway point and the second test at the end ofthe year and atier instruction. y' goal was to invesrigare wherher srraregy use and its oevetof\)F ment were ditlerent for students with weaker pterequisite rnathernatical knowteoie {l) versus students wittr stronger prerequisite knowledge. From discussions at mathematics education conferences we know that not all Dutch teachers agree with the application of the RME Iong division approach. Many teachers contend that the great lariety of strategy types and strategyievers is difficult ,o *unug" in a crassroom. Teachers complain that students weaker in prerequisite knowledle fall behind and do not always progress beyond the lower strategy level of repeald subtraction in small multiples of the divisor (which we cail ,.chunks"). student who us";;il: sions with a long string of additions or subtractions also run the risk of making mistakes in the calculation steps. The solution in Figure 2b illustrates the kinds of calculation errors that can happen. Although the repiated additions in the solution are done weil and even though a nice correction takes prace in the rast step (i.e., subtracting 15 because 43 5 > 432),the computation of the quotient contains an error and results in an incorrect answer (30 rl2). As u some Dutch teachers do not follow the RME lo:rg division approach "onr.qu"r"e, p.o"rt"d in the textbooks, but go on teaching the traditional algorithmic procedure. Therefore, we concentrated our study on schools fonowing the RME approach to rong division, and within each school we differentiated between students with weaker u".rua ,tronger prerequi_ site knowledge for division. *" fourth-research goar was to investigate possibre effects of greater versus a 7 , - tesser emphasis on structuring students, solutions by comparing *r"gv use and development using students from schools using difierent iextbJoks. Dutch RME textbooks differ in the ways in which materiar is presented, aird some textbooks are based on the assumption that students need more encouragement to use larger multiples of a divisor (e.g., with the r0-rule). Therefore, when in Grade 4 division prob_ larger numbers in the divisor and dividend are inhoduced (including also lelns Sine 2-drgit divisors), some Dutch textbooks strongly suggest that students first write dgYn on scrap paper a list of muttipte.s and then ltokiJ.,r," r*g"ripossible chunk of the divisor. To keep.the rist short, the principle of doublig th'e multiplier is followed. For instance,in the case of the bus p.obr"* in Figure-l trie Iist of multi_ plesshouldreadl x 36 36,2 x 36 72,4 x = 36 = 144,g x 36 = 2gg,and = 10 x 36 = 360. The textbook wiG-wererd in Getailen or worrd in Numbers (van de Molengraaf et ar., r9g1) uses this approach. on the other n*a, ,o*" i"*t_ book authors assume that writing down on ,"r"p pup". list of murtiples for every larger division problem might make the solution procedure " too prestructured and might hinder any shorter informat approaches that itudents mig'6t create on their
.

METHOD
Schotols

il

*l[:l:if;::1ch

a4d Subjects

We selected schools from comparable middle-class, socioeconomic neighborhoods irf and around lriden to participate in this study. Afterconducting short interviews with the Grade-4 teachers to find out how closely they followed the realistic approach to teaching long division, we selected 5 schools that used the WiG textbook and 5 schools using the R&lVtextbook. This design balmced out the differences between the realistic textbooks and allowed for a comparative analysis of possible textbook effects on strategy development. Neariy all l0 schools had only one Grade 4 class, with the number of students in each class ranging from22to33. Initially, the total number of participating students was 270. Deleting the data for students who were absent on at least one of the two testoccasions reduced the group to 259 students: 128 girls and 131 boys, with an average age ofabout l0 years at the time they took the first division test.
Tests and Procedures

Division fesfs. We devised two forms of a paper-and-pencil division test, the purposeofwhichwastocollectdataonstudents'solutionsofdivisionproblems.The first form of the divisidn test (hereafter referred to as Test 1), shown in Table I, consisted of 10 pioblems using different number types---combinations of one-digit or two-digit divisors, with or without a remainder, and two-digit to four-digit dividends. Each pioblem was presented with an illustrated context problem or as 5 problem without a context (which we refer to as a "bare number" problem); both kinds of context used similar numbers. Underneath each problem was a box in which students were instructed to write down their work as well as their answer. Of the 5 problems, some involved larger numbers than Grade-4 students probably

Table I
Problems in the First Form of Division Test (Test I )
!

'l:
I
{

Context
1.
98 flowers are bundled in bunches of How many bunches can bemade?

7. 16.

"Bare Number type number,' 2-digit divided 6.96 + 6

7

!
3

2. 3. 4.

i
1

64 pencils have to be packed in boxes of How many boxes will be needed?

. 84

+ 14 + 15

by 1-digit, no remainder 2-digit divided by 2{igit, no remainder 3-digit divided by 2-d\git, remainder 3-iligit divided by 10, remainder

possible differential textbook effect on strategy deveropment, we serected schoors using the wiG textbook as weil as schools using the R&ITtextbook.

own' This more student-centered view can be found in trr" i"*tuoot ;;r: Rekenen en wiskunde or Arithmetic and Mathemarics (Gravemefe., van Garen, Kraemer, Meeuwisse, & vermeulen, r9g5/r9g6). Because we were interested in a

432 cfuldren have to be transported by 15. seater buses. How many buses will be needed?
604 blocks are laid down in rows How many rows will there be?

8. 538

of

10.

g. gO+

* tO

5.

1256 apples are divided among 6 shopkeepers. lO.1542 + 5 How many apples will each shopkeeper get? How many apples will be left?

4-digit divided bY t-digit, remainder

52

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Sr

nut,gie s

('(t,tdis

vtttt Prructt, Perur t'ttrt

lcu llntn-srrijtlcrs.

utul Mcindert lr<'ishui:.t,tr

5-l

40 minutes for students to take each test, and they were abre to finish most of the problems in that time frame. Before taking the first test, a researcher p."r"or"J u pair of practice problems, which were discussed and solved by the whole class. This practice session took about 10 to 15 minutes. The researcher made sure that at least three different informar solutions proposed by students were written in steps on the blackboard- These examples gave the studenis a concrete idea of the type of solutions that were expected, and by practicing them with these two introauciory prob_ lems, they became more familiar with thi testing procedure. while the students worked on t}te practice problems, both the researcher and the classroom teacher could walk.around and monitor the students' work, answering any questions and giving procedural guidance Mathematics levet tesl-The sg{en1s were given a speed test to identify their prior knowledge of number facts and their procedural knowledge of addition, subtraction, and multiplication, which can be considered u, pr"."q-uirit"s for solving long division problems. students were asked to solve troee corrm^ or addition, subtraction, and multiplication problems with a time limit of 1 minute"ury each and rwo columns of more difficult multiplication and two-digit subtraction problems with a time allotment of 2 minutes each. Each corumn contained +o prout"ms, ,o itr" maximum possible total score for each corumn was 40 points. Tie mean correct score (r14) over the five corumn totals was 17.7, witha standard deviation (sD) of 4'l; the mean scores ranged from 6.0 to 30.4. The average corumn score was used as an index'of a student's factual and procedural prior knowledge to investigate its effect on skategy use and also as a covariate in the analysis of cliange between Test 1 and rest 2 and oftextbook effects. This sqore was arso used for a serection oftwo subgroups of 50 stronger and 50 weaker students in a separate analysis for our third research goal. The selection criterion for the stronger and weakei studenrs was a score between the 75th and 95th or between the 5t[ and 25th po"*rii"r, respectively. we excluded students with rarge discrepancies within their profiies based on the five column totars or subjects *ith u deuiunt age to ressen,the iffects of poor performance on some of the problems and any age-related effects resulting from repeating or skipping a grade. The finar subsample coniisted of 50 stronger and

were likely unfamiliar to them at least for the first test o""up1or. we ailowed

coritext problems in Test 1 were presented as bare-number probleris in Test 2, and the bare-number problems as context problems. As we noted above, the division test was taken as a written test and the students were asked to show their work for each problem. students were also encouraged to try to answer the probrems containing larger numbers, although these problems

both tests, but the problem format and position were interchanged; that is, the

problems (e'g.'Problems 4 and 9) also involved a remainder. The students rook *.""; Test I in either January or February of I 998 and a second form (hereaft;; J to as Test 2) about 5 months later in June 199g. The same probiems were used in

were used to working with. For example, in the case of the context problems, problems 2 and 3 have 2-digit divisors and problem 5 has a 4-digit

airia"n,l. sonr.

students-about 5 strong and -5 rveak students fmnr each ol the l0 schools, rlnd 25 strong and 25 weak srudcnts firr each of rhe two textbook groups.
-50 w'eaker

Scrtring tltc Divisiotr Problem Solutiorts

Categori:ation of studenls'str?Ie.qi(,s. Our first research goal was to give

systematic description of the students' long division strategies. In particular, we based this description on various levels of chunkin-u the divisor, considerin-c d"l9i$pfErttSrt,iglErpf the divisoras loy,-levcl chunkin-e (see Figure 2a) and applying the lO-rule as high-level. chunking (see Figure 2c). However, as we analyzed the students' strategies, we observed rnany transition levels in between Iow and lrigh levels, such as spontaneous progressive chunking in which the number of rnultiples of the divisor increased during the calculation process (see Figure 2b). In earlier research in Durch schools, Verbrugh (1997) had already defiiied a collection of chunking types. we decided ro redefine the high-level chunking category according to a sharper criterion of not only applying the I O-rule (or taking 20 times the divisor), but also applying chunking to the remainder of the calculation. So, we tightqned the category of hi-eh-level chunking by excluding solutions with a long series of repeated subtractions or additions, that is, the last steps of the division should consist of only a few chunks as a result of taking multiples of at least three or four times the divisor (see Figure 2c). We also decided that, because of ihe sometimes difficult distinctions between low-level and low-level progressive chunking (see Figure 2a and Figure 2b, respectively), we would combine them into one broad category called low-leve! chunking. Apart from these two chunking levels (high and low), we discriminated between the application of the schematic notation of repeated subtr.action, as taught in the RME textbooks; students either applied schematic notation or there was no indication of such an application- For example, the solutions in Figure 2a (low level) and Figure 2c (high level) involve schematic notation, but Figure 2b exemplified low-level chunking without schematic notation. Using a list of multiples was included as a separate strategy type within chucking, but lot as a separate category apart from chunking. To ensure consistent coding of students' responses to the test problems, rve created a workbook of examples of the different strategies. In order to calculate intercoder agreement, two researchers independentlyscored 94 tests (940 stfategies) from Test I and Test 2. The Cohen's Kappas were significanc 0.70, p < .001, for the agreement on strategy coding for the frst test, and 0.80, p < .001 , for the second test. A full overview of all specific strategies and their occurrences that we found in coding students' workfrom both division tests is given in Table 2. We classified the strategies into l0 main categories and included typical examples from students' work on the third problem frorir the first test (see Table 1). In Table 2 for the first six categories we included important fine-grained informal strategies and the number of solutions that contained them. For example, in Category I (No chunking), nearly EOVo ofthe solutions showed students frequently using addition and subtraction; tallying

54

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55

Table2
Categories and Freauencie.s of Strategy (Jse atul Selectcd Examples

'l'able l-r'orrtirrrrerl

Main strategy

categories
stratesies

.r"r,ff?*"J.1Tfl,trf:Irj:f,ij

Cuteg('ri(t {tnd Frcquetk-i(,s of

Main strategy categories [Fine-grained indented.l Mental

Srrutr.:g), {Jse and Selected Examples

indented.l
l. Nochunking

[Fine-grained

43?children have to be transported uy rs_ieaiei uus;;.

buses

Subqracting Adding kl'IiT )nanng

2Br nZ gg 34 26

will

i;;;rry
I

stratesies

Selected e:amples of strategies used for Problem 3 on Tesi l:

be needed?

432 children have to be transported by lS-seaterbuses. How many

buses

t432

(ansu,er with no work)

calculation

will

be needed?

514

=I5 417 _L5 *1

387

Wrong procedure (e.g., multiplication) 157

IExample]

400: 15=4: l5O0=4lOO

30: 15=3:2=2

10. Unclear (unclassifiable workings)

65

2.

Partitioning

!ffff!",fi'"' ur,
330 chunking 306

=15
fExample:

99. Missing (no answer; no work)

Note. Toral n =
5 I

264

,",1i*," or*no - .g;i#i;

80 (259 students

x I0 problems x 2 tests).

'

3. Lorv-level

Z:15=l
[Exarnple: Doubling]

Low Low.progressive
Doubling and

. halving

i:rz '14
263

l3il3::B
60 + 60 = 120
12O

120

=240

4. Low-leverchunkinswitriascheme
[.ow progressive with a. scheme I_ow with scheme and

Low levet with a scheme

progressive,

Iow

159 -S0 list ii scheme and list id g65 831 -i4

't"^##;'Jl#ll".o -:--' -1;t '-' _@ 4 x 372 60 4 x

3t2

5.

High-Ievel High High level with a

chlnking level list

-60 etc.
to
150

4x

[Example: High level]

30+30+30+30+15

150 = 300

rs =-rlo

6'

High-level chunking with q scheme

rgTo 1096 'ir; High with scheme and list HigMow with scheme and list ,,
!{Sf witn a scheme

tExampte: High with schemel 432 2o x

7.

Traditional

algorithrn

165

300 82 W lZ

2gx

8x

[Example]
15 1432\28

r.t2

30

ru t2
iLn L.
Table 2 antinues

tzz

and sharing were used less frequently. Another rype of informar strategy was P-artitioning (category 2) in which the dividend---and sometimes arso the 2-digit divisor-was partitioned according to place value. The example in the table shows 432 partitioned into 400, 30, and 2. we considered this strategy low-level because this partitioning was done without any evidence of the number relation between dividend and divisor. Another case was partitioning and manipulating with number parts as single digits without any reference to place value. For category 3, Iow-level chunking,in'addrtion to the subcateg oies liw andlow progressive (which the majority of students used), we included ttre strategy of doubling (the divisor) or halving (the dividend) here because we considered them, in general' as less efficientprocedures than strategies based on the l0-rula The exception to this issumption occurred in problem 2 and problem 7 (see Table l)- In these problems, doubling or halving could have been an efEcient strategy because of the numerical relationship between the divisor and dividend (e.g., in prottem 2, the dividend 64 is fourtimes the divisor.of 16). Because using numGrehtions in these problems indicated a higher level strategy, we praced such solutions in a different category. category 4, Low'level chunking with a scheme,resembles category 3, but the solutions classified here showed students' use of schematic notation according to the RME approach. caregory 5 and category 6, High-tever chunking ard High-revel chunking with a scheme, respectively, are the high-level antipodes=of categories 3 and 4, with 'trigh-level" defined not only with regard to the frst step of applying the l0-ruIe, but also to the further steps as mentioned previously. some students used the Traditional algorithmforlingdivision, which we designated as Category 7. when only an answer was given or only a number fact was shown, this was classified as a pure Mental calculation(Category g). Additional strategy categories were the use of a Wrong procedure (Categiry 9; e.g., multiplication instead of division) or a solution procedure that was {Jiclear (Category l0).

56
kurg Dirtision Strategies
The cases in which no,nsrx/a-,,^^:..^ and no ptocedure qiven was shown were cras: siried in comelis von Pufien, Petra t'on den Bntn-snijtrcrs, unt! rv<'itt<h,rt Baisrtui:ttt
57

"r,";.;;'il:;IrrT;.was correctness of answers.The

missing.

coura u" numericar un,*"., For instance, in the problem of how "1i,"", .nuny buses are needed tomswers. tS_r"ut". transport 432 students 1s_ee Figure Zl, tfr. foffowing were considered as r answers t**naer 12; 29 buiett una zs b;"t ..vr,t, seats (cf. tt,"". : e.npty

:: HLTLXT"?o,

c";;.;;;;rs

answers to the division problems were arso scored

",

"ilTiilr]S

Analysis

,: :,ffi:?:ffi*si3;t1;1"
The
10

we used murtipre correspondence anarysis (via HoMALS) to describe the variety and correspondence orsua.ntr; r;;;;;;;J l0 division probtems. As we mendoned previousry' HoMALs' ir ;;-;r;* "rthe for a methodorogy and a compurer program for homogeneity anarysis of c;;;'", variabres, utro t',io,"i as multiple correspondence anarvsis. HoMALs ir u'roniir"u, f"r* comparabte to princioat anarysis Gifi, 1990, p. 104;Van de Geer, L:. 1993, p' l8) that treats "ornpor.n,, the variabres in t'hl'rrr).,, as caregorical variabres and ffies

* IiJ

;i;;i;ir*i"r"

.,*c".i",'"i,r,.J"

"*i"ur". *o ,i* *J",B

as

points

v;l;';'#.1'6#i.?1.,*ff:1.:i,rl tiln.withiino,rieril,r,.-io;,;il;;:i;l3ll,r*tjl*UTlfJilH*

division probiems became l0 categorical variables, one variable problem, each of them for each harirc t0;;;;;";i.;;es as shown in Table 2. To a common quantification securb of the divisioiinffi", for both tests, the data frora Test I were sracked under the data from Test i,;"rriri"g i, a data matrix of 5l g students by l0 variabtes (cr. Bijleverd &

to proceed with the anarysis" *ti"-ri deleting the oudiers from analysis or disiegarding the "r the aimension by.the ourriers is the most ri tuation rn,, i" 6".., l.s s 3, p 27 ).Separare ffi anaryses : H:l;" solutions of equal o" nr"ij,'a (smirs,

ways

alysis ; it provides useful inform"ri;; variabtes, but fails to r"pr"."nt urr the other
an

outtying';;;;" from one ,"rr""i J, a single ;-" irri,ri"ra algorithm) on mosr of problems, and a, *" rhe aii*"rri", io*irr,"a one or more oudiers "*r-:lg;nilili uy """r".,"r. is a.wer-kno*n prr"n;*.non in
atypical sffategy (i.e., Catego.y 7;
multivariate ;;;;;', reJ":l'"t[,:::ffHJ.]:::H":T nonrinear

received scores on a small number However' the first dimension that emergJ Jus not very useful, because it onry discriminated betweena few

"i;fi;;;;r.

i"*i.""a

ffi ifiiiffi

ffi;fi:11,'r',,?l;comgarable

Hovrafsi',,.il#,J13?:ff H1i:r,:":T:;ff ffi:i"*::,*T:i::1*:,flI

;xr:*tt
is availabre in spSS under dara reduction-{ptimal scaring (see Meurman

Having reported the u

'iuo1i,y

HOMALS dimension scores as outcome variable with two repeatd measurements (wittrin-subject factor). Textbook served ds the between-subject factor (two ievelstextbook wiG versus textbook R&IV) and mathematics level was used as covariate. Separate tests showed that neither the between-subject interactions of mathematics level and textbcok for the HOMALS dimensions, F(L, Z5l) = 3.4g, p < .07, and F(l'251) = o.l7,p < .69, nor the within-subject interactions of testoccasion, mathematics lbvel, andtextbook, F(1, 2Sl) = O.eO,p < .66, andF(1, 251) = 9.g3, p < .88, were significant, thus confirming the ANCovA assumption of homogeneous gradients of the-regression slopes. ' rhbse statistical analyser ortn" goilem dimension scores were checked with 2 x2 x 2factor ANovAs on a subset of 100 students (50 with a weak mathematics ievel and 50 with a sffong mathematics level, equally divided over both textbook Ievels), carefully matched for age and mathematics level for each of the I 0 schools . Mean mathematics level scores were M= 13.69 (.sD = 2.03) for the weakerlevel group and M= 21-93 (sD - 2.55) for the stronger-Ievel group. Mathematics level (weak versus strong) and textbook (I4liG versus R&I/) were treated as betweenHOMALS eigenvalue is equal to the mean of the discrimination measures forthe variables (which are comparable.to squared factor loadin_es). The maximum for an eigenvalue is 1.0.
2A

ANCOVA homogeneity assumption. statistical tests on change of strategy use oyer time and.effects of mathematics level and textbook were carried out with 2 x 2 designANCovAs on each of the

normality in the outcome variabres and to upfty u Bonferroni adjustment for multiple testing (i.e., the rwo ourcome variables actuany being uncorrlhted;. Next wg.qive a further specification of the statistical rests with tlsting results for the

produced clearly interpretable discriurinations between the studenls as *,cll :.rs between most of the l0 strategl, categories. The eigenvalues: ol'tlrese di'rcnsi"s were 0.7] (quite strong. rvith discrimination measures ranging frorn 0.62 t, 0.g0) 0,a8 (very acceptable, with discrirni,ation lneasures ranging from 11d 0.36 ro 0'72).1he quantifications of the categories of each variable (which rie call the c(fiegory scores) were used to inteqpret these dimensions (which we cal led scheme using and number relations andwhich we describe in greater detail in the Results section ofthis articlefand further respond to our first research goal. To investigate Research Goals 2, 3, and 4, we used students' scores on both dimensions as outcome variables to describe changes in strategy use over time and to anaryze the impact of students' mathematics level and textbook on strategy use. we conducted three types of statistical tests: (r) ANCovAs on the HOMALS dimension scores for all students with mathematics level scores as covariate; (2) ANovAs on the HOMALS dimension scores for a subsample of r00 srudents with matheinatics level as a between-subject factor (weaker students versus stronger students); and (3) an ANCovA on the achievement scores (number of irems correct) lbrall students with mathematics level scores as covariate. All ANcovAs were carried out in SPSS with General Linear Model procedures. An alpha level ofp = .31 was used for all statistical tests to compensate for some departures from

&

Heiser,

-s8

ktng Division Strutegies

conrclis vtn Pur!er\ pdnt

t'.tn tran

rlnurt-sttijtrars, ttttrr Mr,itttr<,r! Ilt,isrtui:t,tt

-59

subject factors; the two repeated measures of the HoMALS dimension scores rvere treated as a

icantbasedonthealphalevetof.Ot,f(t,ZiiJ-=
rs.E

tests as the repeated outcome " factor), textbook variabre (within-subject as between_ subject factor, and mathematics lev"r ur A separate test for homogeneity of the covariate slopes showed that "oru.i"t". the betr"or-ruuj""t interaction of mathematics level and textbook was not significant, F(1,251) = 0.03, p < .gl.The within_ subject interaction of ."st occasion, mathemaiics level, and teitbook was not signif_

A final 2 x 2 factor ANCovA was carried out using a,25gstudents, with divi_ sion achievement (number of correct answeo o" ,t l0 division problems) on both

within_subject factor.

solutions slrowed no chunking or a low-levelchunking of the divisor. or partiri.uin,. of the dividend; these stratesies nright be viewed as more prirnitivc. Also, a .ur,bcr of probl'ems were skipped or left out (gvo), or were wrongry approached as nrurtiplications (57o). About 807o of the solutions in the secondtest couto be considered as sophisticated, with schematically high chunking of the divisor used in more rhan 507o of the solutions; only ZVo of the problems were skipped.

$ iFri
*1,'i
tf1::1

subject covariate effect itself_wu, noi ,igniR"anr, F(1, 2SZ) = 0.95, p < .34, the covariate was dropped fr=i1"-yfthin-r"uU;""t fu.t of this analysis, resulting in an ANOVA rather than an ANCOVA.

+.fS,p <.05.Becauserhewithin_

tions on both tests (between 63vo RESULTS

Research Goal I : Descriptive Analysis of Strategy (Jse

correctness of ansv"'ers in Tests and 2. The data in Table 3 show that the percentage ofcorrect answers rose from 47vo for Test I to 6gvo forTest 2. There were differences in correctress of answers between strategies, ranging from l golo correct for problems solved by partitioning strategies in th&rst tes ltolgEo for hi-eh-level chunking-with-a-scheme strategies in the "oo"t second test. Use of the high_ level chunking and mentar strategies resultedin a higherpercentageofcorrect soruand,

Tgvo)

and,

!ti,,!

:I
,;r
Ei;:.
i:tj,''

(Categories I to 4) giving better results o nTestz (40vo to 6zvo co',e,,t) as compared to Test I (187o to 49Vo correct). The results of the traditional algorithmic solutions (36Vo and 47 Vo correct) were no better than the results of the low-level solutions.

the more primitive solutions

ij,

ti

division tests. In thefirst test, highlevel chunking of the divisor, mentat sotutions, and sorutions based on the tradi_ tional algorithm comprised more than rraroritrl solutions (54vo),and we consid_ ered these strategies as being rather sophisti"ui"a. on the other iuJ, zzE" nt

strategy use in Test I and Test 2 problems. The data frequency of the strategy categories from both

in Table 3 show

the

*"

Table 3

q:.I:sv,

''Ti$lLflf t.Yj:f,L",
9. Wrong

=. t 'ei rig 6 ,8 i l*,::::: lg1 3.Lowchunking 244 S 2 37 *?:H::illHlE 166 a it + ig chunking 483 tg 3tZ t5 65 . s74 22 igZ s4 7t T,til:lfJfjg .
l. No chunking
5. High

f"r, t

Division Tests

1] (testins times) points-for a total of 5lg data points--on those same two HoMAr-s dimensions. Although some pattems for those scores between the figures
are

will be explained further in another section ofthis article.) Figure 4 shows the 259 (students)
immediately visible (for example, the small isolated cluster of scores at the upper-

Integrated descriptiott of strategy use over bothrests. Figure gives 3 a pictorial representation of the strategies of each division problem on the second and third HoMALs dimensions of scheme using and number relations. This figure contains 10 (strategies) x l0 (problems) caregory poinrs-for a total of 100 poi-nrs-labeled by strategy category number (see Tabrei 2 and 3). (The arrow in Figure 3 represents the general directicn and amount of change in strategy use,-and

left side of each figure), for the interpretation of the dimensions we need the strategy category scores shown in Figure 3. Figures 3 and 4 are complementary

;;
jB
47 63 0 69 68

40

62 73

they share the HOMALS dimensions, but we present them as iwo figures only for the sake of clarity. In HoMALS, the relation between the 100 caregory points in Figure 3 and the 518 student-testing points in Figure 4 is defined in the following way: each category point, representing one specific strategy for one partic'ular problem, is in the geometric cinter of ihe studenrtesting-points those

because

z2B e

7t

286 u
3g zsii S: 2590 Z 98 Z 100

36
O

$
5t _ 47

I 19 5 lo.UnctearllziitogD subtotal 2379 92 99. Missing g Tl ^_.* ,,90 100

procedure

Note. Total n = 2590 (259 srudent"

tO

proOffi

. This relationship ber'ween strategy category and student scores has the following implication. when categories from different problems are very close to one another, thus showing strong correspondence, this suggests that the strategies are being used by the same students. For the sake of clarity, we present in Figure 5 a version of Figure 3 but with clusters of points circled that illustrate partic-ular patterr.rs in ttre data. For example, the cluster of category points labeled 1 and 9 at the bottom-right

aom tne aata set we know that on the first or second test27 students solved Problem 5 with the Traditional algorithm (Category 7). If one would mark in Figure 4 only those 27 student poinrs, their center would correspond to ttre single category point labeled ..7', in Figure 3.

students using this strategy on that problem. For example,

of

$LlE{.--*,

60

It n

D iv i s i t

trt.lrft rr(.(i{,.s

Cornclis wtn Puttcn, petra,on den Brom_Sni.irlcrs, uncl Meindert llcishui:.cn

l)t

10
0

c 6
o o o
E
f

w7 *O\',lff
n4

lodm#r

oo
dlJ

a 1 E 6

:-1

*u

5-l

,E[ t i3 #? oo: u aI' ! "'t t# rl ir ir t*o o '"ff

I
E

=oa

,li ,8ot Iar .Ea I

&
T

*q oO *t+ lT lf, o
! o' o

otf *, * rt f, icl "#'

!a- ,# -! t tt@ clB o
a

ud{'

ic
o

I
r

10

'

1/e1s
1d
gBg

6 !

t tu uq
tl:ag

G Aq oS -" '{ ! nl

ll .

5-2 z

B
o
oE

991

rf

I
U

{'
E

..D

Jl,

L3l ,%

t F

-1

0 Scfreme using

Figure 3. categories of division strategies on the HoMALs dimensions. Iro'e' The anow points from the mean score on Test r to the mean on Test 2 and depicts the general direction and amount ofchange in strategy ,a. ou".,i.".-'-

Frgzre 4. Students' standardized scores for both division iests on the HOMALS dimensions.
lVore. Scores were standardized with M 0 and.SD =

= l.

applies to the upper-right cruster of category p-oint, tuu"t"a s s in Figure 5; students using the High-level chunking t"itt out u scheme srrategy (Category 5) on some of the problems tended to use a Mental calculation strategy (category. g) on other problems. Also, the partitioning (category 2) and r"o*-r"uiii*niig *iaout a scheme (category 3) strategies, rocated in the figure, seem to clusteriogether. 9' *" other hand, the spread of the category r0 responses (unclear) over most of the figure indicates that this category aiJnot systemarically cf the other categories. "oo"rj*Jwith any The aforementioned relation bllween the strategy category points in Figure 3 and the student points in Figure 4 implies ttrat st'dents using auout the same sf,ategies on the same problems are getting positions in Figure 4 thaiare very n"* *"r, otrr"r. po, example, thecluster of l2.srudents at the upper-left part a"r" students have commonalities in ueir strategy "ffrom the use, and cluster shown in

portion of Figure 5 indicates that there were students using the No-chunking (category l) on some problems, and that these same students arso used a :_Tategy wrong procedure (categ^ory 9) on otherprobrems. Those students are rep."sented by the cluster of points-found at the botLm-right portion or nigore

ia

+.-,ihe same

Fig*;;;li"riiut

!.,

M.*.. *

are all on the left side of the graph. All the other nonschematic saategies appear on the right side: Partitioiring (category 2), L6w-level and High-lwel cihunking (Categories 3 and 5), Mental calculation (Category g), No chunking (Category l), and wrong procedure (category 9). This differentiation can be inierpreted as the extent of schernatization, or scheme asing, an interpretation that corrisponds with the sqhematizing notion of Treffers (1987) and Ruthven (199g) that we menrioned in the introduction. It also reflects the important objective of RME for long division: building upon informal solutions toward ones that follow the scheme of repeated subtraction in a more or less efficient forrn. As we report later'in this section, changes on only this dimension were related to the type of textbook used. If, we use this interpreration of tlie clusters of points in Figure 3, ihe Traditional algo-

Figure 3 located at that position, we may conclude that they mainly used the Traditional algorithm (category 7). Thus, these students are homogeneous in their strategy use. In Figure 3, tlre horizontal dimension (from Ieft to rig-h0 aiscriminut", urnoig *,r"" larger groups of strategy categories: Traditional algorithm (cate cary 7),High-level schematic chunking (Category 6), and Low-level schematicchunking (Category 4)

b2

Llrtrrctl.\

taiil I iltl('tt.

I l.lrll

ttt:t ucil trt<rilt_\rttt!<lctt,

uttal tvrcrilatctl

D(,)rt,tti(tt

is not inllucncctl by dit'lerences in strategy use among the l0 problenrs. In other

words,reproducin,rFigure3foreachproblernseparatelywouldresultin l0very
Mental (8)

10

o F .o o :-1 o !
E
s.rs.:

q c

Traditional(7) :
Low

7 @"\.'' I t?':-'
"ch"r"

High with

Partitioning

withsch.-"\S;

r"\

10

\y

Low (3)

= z.

lro

t?.",i

i3:,';, :{!l

lsg I
[,l",Ui$'"n
(1)

i,r\\

+!:

l\.

conrparablc figurcs with the same relative positions of the strategy points as in tlre total tigure, except tbr the Wrong procedure category (10). This holds, as well, for differences that one might expect between the "bare number" versus the context problenus and between the l-digit versus 2-digit divisor problems. In contmst to the clustering of category points in Figure 3, most of the points in Figure 4 show a rather continuous spread of student scores indicating the use of a variety of strategies over the set of problems. This continuous spread of students' scores occurs especially along two densely populated directions. First, there is a continuum of student scores along the vertical number relations axis running, in terms of the corresponding category positions of Figure 3, from Wrong/Nochunking strategies (lower righq Categories 9 and I ) to Low.chunking/ Partitioning strategies (middle right, Categories 3 and 2), and to High chunking/Mental strategies (upperright, Categories 8 and 5). Second, there is the scheme-using direction from High-chunking with a scheme (center and to the left of the arrow, Category 6) to High-chunking without a scheme/l\rfental (upper right, Categories 5 and 8). The dimension scores for the students given by HOMALS in Figure 4 are standardizrd(M = 0 and SD= l) wittr the scheme-using dimension running from schematic (negative scores, minimum -2.99) to not schematic (positive scores, maximum 1.54) and the number relations dimension from no us (negative scores, minimum -4.10) to intense use (positive scores, maximum 1.48). These dimension scores will be used as outcome variables in the statistical analyses we report in the next sections.
Research. Goal

-1

0 Scheme using

Figure 5.ldenttfied clusters of categories of division stiategies on the HOMALS dimensions.

Note-

Figre

5 is identical to Figure 3, but the category clusters are marked for ease ofidentification.

2: Changes in Strategy

{Jse and Correctness

ofAnswers

rithm (upper left, category 7) is seen as a further abbreviation of High-level chunking with a scheme (to the left of the arrow, Category 6). The vertical dimension of Figure 3 (from bottom to top) discriminates the categories wrong procedure (category 9), No-chunking (category l), and Low-level schematic chunking (category 4), from all the other strategies. This dimension can be interpreted as the extent to which number relations arcused, with intensive use ofthis kind ofrelations appearing at tlre top, especially the strategies in High-level chunking (Gategories 5 and 6), Mental computation (catego.ry g), Traditional (category 7), and Partitioning (category 2), and iefrequent use ar the botrom ofthe graph, especially No-chunking (category l) and Low-level schematic chunking (category4). Low-level chunking (category 3) is somewhere in between, whereas wrong procedure (category 9) comes at the very bottom position. Later, we present 'findings that show that the number relations dimension is related to the mathemafics level of the students. The similar groupings of the same strategy category of different problems, for
example, the cluster of 6s to the left of the arrow in Figure 3, indicate thit this picture

In the HOMALS analysis, each student received two pairs of dimension scores, one pair per test. Table 4 shows the observed means of all students' scores on the HOMALS dimensions for both tests. These observed means can be represented as two points in Figure 3. The arrow in the figure going from the mean score for Test I to the mean score for Test 2 depicts the general direction and amount of change

Table 4 Mean Scores on Both Division Tests by HOMA|S Dim.ension and Correctness
Scheme using

Number relations Adj.

Correct answers

Cbs.
Ma Tesr Test

SD

pb

Obs.
Ma

SD

Adi. Obs. SD MbMyb

-{.38
0.26 4.7
6.8

Adi.

I 0.35 0.99 0.33 -{.39 2 4.29 0.96 4.29 0.26

1.32

0.66

2.91 2.61

4.7
6.8

Nore. HOMAIJ dimension scores were standardized with M = 0 and.!D = l. a.Observed means depicted in Figure 3. b Means adjusted fbrihe mathematics level covariate in ANCOVA I a;d ANCOV.A 3, with n =259 and n = 255, respectively.

64

Ittng

D iv is io rt

S t rate

gies

Corndis ren Pr*e,. Petro

vurt

rt'tt Iln,rr-stti.j,rt,r:. ttrtd fit,intrr,rt r]<,itrttti-,.tt

6-5

matics level as covariate, showed a significant time effect on scheme using, < = .001, as well ur on r." of number relations, F(1, 252) :\l:?52) -13.08,p = p < .001 30 . This
'93,

ANCovAs on the strategy dimension scores with time (i.e., from Test l to Test 2) as the within-subject factor, textbook as between-subject factor, and
mathe-

in strategy use. It shows a strategy cha.ge between Test I and rest 2 toward amore frequent use of schematic solutions as ivell as of number relations,

corresponds with a lowered, even negative, HOMALS score. ANovA results on the number of correct answers showed a signifibant time effect, F(r,257) =. 148'87, p < '001, indicating that students increlsed their number of correct answers from Test I (M = 4.7) to Test 2 (M = 6.g).
Research Goal 3: Mathematics Lever, Strategy (Jse, anrr correctness of Answers Table 5 shows the mean student scores on the HOMALS

of schematic solutions and number rerations increasbd from Test l (Adjusted M-= 0.33 and Adjusted M = -O.3g, respectively) to Test 2 (Adjusted M = {).29 and Adjusted M = 0.26, respectivery). Aninc.rr"d ,"o." for scheme using arbitrarily
use

result indicates that, usirrg the adjusted means in Table 4, the

.9

o :-1
o

: z
E -2

1Hffi *U .
'r
1#1s
10 10 ps

dimensions according to mathematics lever and test occasion for the two mathematics lever subgroupssfudents with a weaker versus a stronger mathematics level. These means can be as :.ryeseyed four "points" connected by the two arrows labeled S (stronger) and w (weaker) in Figure 6. The arrows in Figure 6, going from the means for Test 1 to the means forTest 2, depict the chang" i-, ,r.ut"gy use according to mathematics Ievel, showing that at Test l the weaker*lever subgroup (depicted by the base ofthe w arrowJ was using more primitive strategies and fewer number relations than the stronger level group (depicted by the base ofthe S arrow), but that at Test 2 the two s. olpt.kl*:more equar in strategy use, both using moie high-rever anJ schemaric ttT:"gT-!": depicted by the location of the arrow heads). ANCovAs on the strategy dimension scores averaged over Test 1 and rest 2 (the between-subject effects), showed that mathematics lever, as a covariate, onry affected significantly the use of number relations, F(1, 252) = 32,74,p < .001, indicating thatahighmathematics lever corresponded with ahigh lever of numberrelationsused

gil

-1

0
Sc-heme using

Figure 6-Change in srategy use according to mathematics level on the HOMALS dimensions. Nore' Tfe, alollabeled S reprcsents the change from Test I to Test 2 for the stronger students and the
arrow labered

represents this change betwien tests for the weaker students.

Table 5

y;;;s**tnr

Both DivisionTests by HoMArs Dimension and students, Mathematics

Stronger

Test I
Test 2

o.32

Weaker

Test I
Test 2

-o.30
0.46

0.90 0.96
o.92

0.20
0.48

1.01

0.55
1.53

4.12 1.01 A'ote. HOMALS dimension scores were standardizea *itt rrzl oilJso-]T Total z = 100, with 50 studenrs in each rnutt Lr"i."' "*u,io
a&- e

-1.04

0.2t

0.79

mathematics level increased their use of number relations more than students wiih a high mathematics level, r - -.22, p < .001. These high level students had already demonstrated frequent use of number relations during the first test. ANovAs comparing the two mathematics leveliubgroups also indicated that mathematics level only affected the use of number relations, F.( I 95) 24.13, , p < .001, meaning that the stronger students used more number relations= than the weaker students did over both tests. Scheme using was not affected by mathematics level, F(1, 96) = 1.27,, < .27.Inthe same analyses there was only a significant effect of mathematics level on the change in the use of number relations between

r = .29,p < .001. However, there was no significanteffectof mathematicslevelonschemeusing, F(1, 252) 0.45,p < .51: = The same ANCovAs showed a significant within-subject effect of the covariate, indicating that the amount of change in strategy use between Test I and rest 2 was dependent on mathematicb level, but only for number relations, F(1,252) = 14.56, p < .001, and not for scheme irsing, F(1, ZSZ) = l.T, p <.20. Stuaents with a low
to solve division problems on both tests,

ffi
ffi,
r$ii'

ti(r
Tcst I a'd Tesr 2. F(1, 96) 15.97,,, =
a stronger rnathematics.level

lpng

Divi.rion Strategies

conrclis ,an Puren, Petrct van den Brom-snijtrcrs,

cmd

Meirtdcrt rJcisruti:.t,tr

b7

ii'
*:r.
?!,"

irrcrea.seduseofrru,rberrcrations(fromar=-i

< .001, with weakerstudents showilrg

.o4toM=0.2r)thanstudentswith

an

:,i

ii

i.','

between mathenratics level and the nu*U", oi.orrect answers r , = .47 , p < .01. Therefore' prerequisite knowledge ur *"ur*.i uy the speed t"rt i, ira""a important for corectly sol ving long di-vision ;;;;;r.
Research Goal 4: Textbook, Strategy (Jse, and Correctness ofAnswers

combined, showed, as we expected, that the covariate ,rathematics_revel had u ,igniri*nt effect over both tests taken together, F(1, 252) - 70.62, p < .Oorlinai"ating
a

(frorn M = 0.20 to M O.4g). = The '^NC,VA on division actrie iremeni u, nr"urrr"d by the number of correct answers on both rests

use

administered, whereas wiG students werc between tllis strategy and other Higlr_level strategief (catryory 5) and Mental sorutions (Category g). ANCovAs indicared that the effect oftextbook over both tests taken together was only significant on rhe

roongpori,iu"rJationstip

mean dimension scores ^^1i fi*'*to textbook according are representecr by arrows labered according to the textbooks used: R& 17 an d wic- The arrows clearry show that R& w studentr *"* .ouirg to the use of High-rever schematic rou,"gi." fir"gory 6l at rhe time rhat Test 2 was

7' straregy use and changes in srudenrs'

0.45, p < .07. As shown in Table 6, IViG srudenrs had higher scores on the number relation dimension than R& I,Iz students. The time+extbo-ok interac_ tion in these analyses showed rhat textbook only affected change in scheme using, F(1,252) = 135.89,p < .001' Change in use of numberrelations was not signiiicantly different between rhe rextbooks, F(l, Z5Z) 6.39, p < .OZ. The ft&lV = students' solutions'becamefarmore schematic betweenTest I (Adjusted M = o.il) and rest 2 (Adjusted M -- 4.54) surpassing the wic students; Lver, whereas the wiG students' mean score did not change much (Adjuste d M r.09 and Adjusted = M = l.ll for Tests I and2, respectively).

ofrrumberrelations, F(1,252)

F{l.252)

36.92,

p<

.001, and not on scheme using.

Table 6 Textbook
Obs.

Scheme SD 0.66 0.71

Number relations

Ma

Adi. 74b
0.77

Obs.

SD
1.46 0.61 1.07

Adj.
Mb

Ma

R&W

q7

*B
a4

wiG

Test I Test 2 Test I

Test 2

0.77

-{.53
-o.09 -c.03

l.1l

1.09

-o.54 -o.10

-0.69 0.r0

4.76
0.08 0.01 0.45

-{.03

-{.06
0.43

0.66

/Vore. HOMALS dimension scores werc standardi zed with M O and SD l. = a Observed means depicted in Figu rc 6, n Z5g. = D Means adjusted for the mathematics level covariate in ANCOVA l, n=255.

*U.
-

'r 10 10 99
9gl
o

lleb
= p < .001,andnotonschemeusing, f(1, 96) = 0.13,p < .72. No interactionof
ANovA results on the subgroups of weaker and stronger mathematics level students confirmed that the textbook effect on strategy use over both tests taken together was significant only on t}re use of number relations, F(l 96) 19.41, ,

textbook and mathematics level took place in the between part of the design, F(2' 95) = 0.36, p < .71. This finding was confirmed by the atsence of the mathematics level covariate by textbook interaction meotioned in the analysis section

Figure 7' change in strategy use according to textbook used on the HOMALS dimensions. R& lvand MG correspond ro the change in strareSy ';:lJff..ln::labeled

use by sruden* who used

= +.49,0 . .gO. ANCovA results showed no textbook effect on division achievement over both tests taken tqgether, F{1,252) = 0.43, p < :52, when the mathematics level was kept constant for wiG and R&w. The within-subject analysis without covariate
numberrelations,.F(1, 96)
showed a significant textbook effect on the chanse in achievement between both

of this article. The same analysis indicated a significant textbook contribution for change in scheme using, F(1, 96) = 49.96, p < .001, but not for chauge of

r
68

I ) i v i.t

t t t

r.S'rlzrrtjir,.s

Contelis t'on Putte.n, Pelra vm den Bront-Stti.itlers, ctnd Meindert Beishuizen

69

tests, F(

l, 257) =

39.

l8'

p<

.00 r . Rct IV srudents raised

the wiG students whose means increased from 5.2 to 6.2, indicating --"' aitre.enl growth trajectories for division achieveme,t according ,o ,"*,iloor..
DISCUSSION

coirect answers r\'om M = 4.3 on Test r to M

their rneun nur.rber

or

=i.3

on Test 2, thereby surpassing

In this section, we reflect on the resurts of the study, on the varidity of the strategy categorization, and on our method of measuring a student,s strategy. we conclude with some limitations of the study and with the implications of ourresults for school practice.
Categorization of l^ong Division Strategies
The first and main goar of this study was to categorize rong division strategies, and especially to capture the variety of more advanced crruiting strategies. we found that, just after the introduction of long division, Grade 4 stuients were using all of the strategy categories that we devised. High-chunking strategies were already used_ morg frequently than low- or no-chunking strategies, bui a considerable number of missing, unclear, and completely wrong strategies arso occurred. Five months later this divergence was reduced to mainly highJever chunking, with only mental and partitioning strategies being tised to u .Jd"rut" extent, and prim-itive or missing strategies having decreased tonsiderably. our iO-category system covered all the types of division solutions that were found in stud-ents' work. Intercoder agreement was good, so the categories seem to be mutually exclusive. somewhat greater differentiation could be possible for the most frequently occurring high-chunking category (see Table 2). The multiple correspondence analysis of strategy use over alt 10 division problems and for both test occasions revealed both discontinuity and continuity of student and strategy scores on the HoMALS dimensions. ihe onty cluster of students really separate! frol all the others (see Figure 4) whs an atypicar group of sffategy users consisting of a very small number of students from one sctrool in wh]$ &e traditional atgorithm was frequentry taught (category 7, see Figures 3 Td 5); tt is ."sult rhen could presumably refleci a specific teachei effect. This algorithm was included in older textbooks before RME became the standard approacri in Dutch mathematics textboolcs. Note also that the strategy graph in Figure 5 shows that corresponding strategy categories of the l0 probtein-s were grJuped rather closely together; see, for example, the crus(er of ten 6s for high-revel chunking with a scheme. It implies that there was some tendency for studenti to use the same strategies for all the probrems- This holds especially for either high-revel (Category 6) or low-level (category 4) chunking strategies with a scheme. other siudents used a combination of two different strategies over the l0 probrems, especiafly nochunking stiategies and using a wrong procedure (Categories I and 9, respectivery), or partitioning and low chunking without a scherne (-ategories 2 and'3,respec-

tively). or high-level chunking without a sclteme and mental calculations (Categories 5 and 8. rpspectively). This all ret'lects the idea that students were using one type of strategy or a combination of strategies on either Test I or Test 2, regardless of the typ-e of problem. However, as we mentioned in the Results section, the graph in Figure 4 shows a rather continuous spread of student scores indicating the use of a variety of strategies over the set of problems. So our quantitative approach was successful in capturing discrete as well as continuous aspects of students' strategy use.

Validin,of the Strategy

Categorizatio,x

Further support for the usefulness of our category system and the corresponding analysis dimensions comes from our findings conceming changes of strategy use over time and differences in strategy use depending on students' mathematics level and textbook use. After 5 months of division instruction, students progressed in two directions (see Figure 3) in that they generally increased their use of number relations in

their solutions, as well as their use of schematization. However, these changes depended on the mathematics level of the students and on the type df textbook used in their schools, with both factors actually being independent ofeach other. Mathematics level affected the use of number relations over both tests, as expected. However, the weaker students increased their use of number relations more than the stronger students did over the 5 months of our study; however, they lagged behind the stronger students in nrrmber of correct answers. The type of textbook affected the use of number relations: Students follOwing the approach in the WiG textbook used more number relations than students using the R&W textbook, especially on the first test. On the other hand, differential change in sg'ategy use only occurred on the schema-use dimension. R&W students surpassed the WiG group in the use of schematic solutions, aS was also the case with their number of colrect answers' Methodological Considerations for Measuring a Studcnt's Strategy
Overall, our category system for describing division strategies resulted in meaningful discriminations and results. This system is surprisingly comparable with the categorization in a recent qualitative study by Ambrose et al. (2003) done mainly in Gradps 4 and 5. Also, the kind of division instruction used in their study relemof varibtes the RME approach of our study in its focus on whole-group discussion study our in Both algorithm. a standard absence of the and ,1rut"gi"t eties of solution
a pattern and in the study done by Ambrose et al. there is a distance between the data,

of encoded solutions to a number of problems, and the inference about an overall divistrategy that a single student uses or constnicts in a certain period to tackle a inferring of sion froblems. In a cognitive psychological framework, this step a as conceptualized student's cognitive strategy from a behavioral record is often way theoretibal precise a question of diagnosis, wtrich is not easily answered in (Newell & Simon, 1972; Ohlsson, 1989). We circumvented this diagnostic problem

throughourrnultidimensionalquantificationapproachtoastudent'sStrateg)luse

70

L(urS
.I)iri:;i()nslran<jr.e,s

'

Cttnrclis ,on Pulren, parnt wut trut Bnnn-saijders, and Mcinderr

Bcisrtuigu

being tested. Inte-gration "gi?r r'rJ q"rriin"ation ofstudent behavior" over a series of problems is impossi"ble i, rn;r;;;*;. . In contrast, our approach can be considered as a murtivariate extension ofthe "merhodof content analysis" in which,traairi"*uv," is applied to (rhe etements of) a corpus (ohtsson, igag, zsz;_r,

its revelation of very concrete sorution mate_ rial standing in for more ib.t u"t **ogy Its drawback is the separation between information abor.rt "or"epts. the rn *a information u-u*, ,t gro,rp ofstudents

\!i)."r""tirg u pi;;;" [solution] corpus and printing it in full [in.order] to exhibira tvpi"at"cai"i't6ii"on, r989,p. zi:i. it.i s*engrh of this method-of-excerpt approach is

-"tt oJ crearry goes further than the approach of Ambrose et al., which can be characterized as a "method of excrrott

rr is rr". dt r ;i;;;;;.,;ino'nJt"ag". rn"r" dimension scores courd meaningfulryi" ". ""","r inr"|r","a as the extent to which schema_ tization had beJn reached ,rJ;;#";"."'r'#ns were ava,abre for the student solving a series of long division in

over a ser of probrems. specificaily, each student was attributed scare varues on two d i mensions that crraracterized

dominant textbooks in the Netherlands. conrpared to the Dutch, Englisll students showed lEss prog.ession in strate-{y use ancl achievement in a sltuation rvith emphasis on a standard algorithrl atier an introduction of division
strategies (Anghileri et al., 2002).

with intbrmal

p..ur"*r.

ir,i,

ffirrii.rr,*

I mp licat ions for

S c hoo

I P ractice

i.*o

moder (Coombs, 1964; Guttman, 1950)' In the scalogram moder the r"rponrJ. or,r," ,*a"ri mined by their scare uIr"; ,h" r*a"rior". ,rrose rrem categories that are a"t"r_ nearest to its scale value. The drawback of thir typ" model is that in most cases rhe response patterns do not fit into suli "ii""rministic , ."uring *odel. H,MALS, however, fits all the srudenrs by accepting "fuzzyuorna*i"yiu"rr""n

is an extension of the

lr, or rot, _ ""l"T.o[u, murrivariate approach made it to study the deveropment or,toao,trl division srrategie;-in a systematic and quantitative way and over tim" una io ass"ss the impact of mathematics level and textbook on strategy yr" 1rg its deveropmenr. one could say that H.MALS tries to fit a multidimensional determiniJl moaer for scaring the responses of students on a number of iteris with m"." ,h;;;;; ,ominal response caregories. This

i. tions for a number of &vision pr"bil.'firs possibre

r.;;;il;

advanced, schematic chunking strategies within 5 months, with the highest percentage of correct answerc-at least on the tests developed for our study-This conclusion even applies to the strategy development of weaker mathematics level students- on the other hand, emphasis on instruction in chunking and schematization procedures, which is typical of the wiG textbooks, immediately encourages 'the use of many schematic solutions, also resulting within 5 *onth. in fairly advanced strategies, including mental and high-level informal ones. Somehow this approach seems to elicit more use of number relations, but not alwayscorrect ones,

Returning to school practice, the dif,ferential effect of the textbooks provides some _ interesting information about important RME principles. we may conclude that an emphasis on students' informal strategies and own constructions (in the R&w textbooks) encourages starting with many low-level strategies, but it results in

fairly

one-dimensiorJ;"d";;

-"lr,ifri"ry

m" ii"i-*regories.

Limitations of the Study

we consider some limitations of _ our study and explore their consequences for the validity of our concrusions. To o"* time within reasonabre rimits, only a sma, set of division probrems to elicit worked sorutions and . :answers from the stirdents. ""urii",i"a How"r"t ," u"ri"u"'*" r.n"rulize from this set to division as a whole, because trr" prour""un carefully constrticted to cover different tvpes of division probrems, ura u""uus" Here

*",

r;;;",

clearly visible in this study's R&IVtextbook, Research on addition and subtraction up to 100 in a RME framework showed the same kind of benefits of emphasizing informal strategies (Klein et al., 1998). The main practical implication of this study is the confirmation of the effectiveness of progressive mathematization in the RME approach, now in the domain of division arithmetic with students in Grade 4 of primary school where a clear progression in strategy use and achievement toward good standards was dernonstrated. This extends the value and efficacy of the RMB approach from younger to 'older students. This conclusion also holds for students with a rather *"ut *utt "matics level, contrary to common expectations in school practice. whether this effectiveness also holds to the final grades of primary school, and whether the effectiveness of RME is greaterthan thatof more traditional approaches, as was suggested by thd Dutch-English comparison, remain questions r#R .rr", inrestigarion.

"oo""nt informal mental strategies, strengthening the approach that was already most

little. New Dutch RME textbooks, revised in the 1990s,

so students' achievement as measured by our testing instruments lagged behind a

ut" more on

schoors are questions that remain to b" unr*"rJ uy trthe. research. are confined to schoors and students ,ring RME types of

out .ray was conducted in a sma, number "t of middle-crass schools where the students, mathematics abirity in the sense of their rever of prerequisite knowledge was quite :trong' as illustrated by the speed test scores. qal"tn.i o* resulrs g.n".rr_ rzed to srudenrs attending working_class ,"tooi,

not related at all to the strategy

ai**rio*

*" rounitt uiiliJiilri,y *", u*"";;-,h; .;;d.'ii,i,

REFERENCES

"*i" o,io"il";;;r";ffiladon
our

of

Ambrosc, R.,.Baek, J-M., & Carpenter, T. P. (2003). Children's invention of multidigit multiplication and division algorithms. In A. J. Baroody & A. Dowker (Ed s.),Thc devetopmmt of aihmeticioncepts and skills: Constructive adaptive expertise (pp. 301-336). Mahwah,.NJ: Lawrenle Erlbaum Associares. Anghileri,J. (2001a). Development of division strategies for Year 5 pupits in ten English schools. Brirrslr Educationlal Research Journal, 27, 85-103.

resurts textbook, which are rhe

Anghileri' J. (2001 b). Inruidve approaches, mental strategies; and standard algbrithms. In J. Anghileri (Ed.), Principles andpracrice in arithmetic teaching (pp. z-9-94;. eucurighur,i ux' open univlrsky press.

Anghileri' J.' & Beishuizen, M. (1998). Counting, chunking and the division algorithm. i{arlrcmatics
in School,27,24: