Interactive Learning Resource

For our Learning Design Project, Yiran, Jingyun, Saksham and I chose to focus on teaching fraction concepts to early learners by addressing misconceptions, anxiety and motivation. Fractions are a foundational concept in mathematics all over the world, yet many students struggle to understand them. According to Infinity’s article, Learning Fractions: A Scoping Review, there are three factors that contribute to difficulties with basic fraction concepts: ontogenic, didactical and epistemological obstacles. Ontogenic are issues related to students' level of readiness and motivation towards learning. Didactical are problems through instructional design and teaching methods and epistemological are misunderstandings regarding fraction concepts (Suryadi et al., 2024). Success with fractions is often a tell-tale sign of success later in more challenging notions as they align with skills needed to solve ratios and algebraic equations. Without a strong foundation of fractions, difficulties in math can persist through higher grade levels and post secondary schooling, leading to increased anxiety and a decreased motivation to learn. 

Part of the reason that fractions are difficult for younger learners to grasp is because they require students to think past everything being simply a whole number. The article by Science Direct, the natural number bias and magnitude representation in fraction comparison by expert mathematicians, discusses the natural number bias, which is a tendency for learners to apply the same rules to fractions as whole numbers. For example, students may believe that 1/4 is larger than 1/3 because 4 is larger than 3 (Halme et al., 2024). This type of misunderstanding indicates that students see fractions as two sets of whole numbers instead of one quantity that represents a part of a whole number. Along with misunderstandings with fractions, emotional factors can play a role in a student's ability to learn. From the article math anxiety differentially impairs symbolic, but not nonsymbolic, fraction skills across development by The New York Academy of Sciences, anxiety towards mathematics can significantly impact students ability to perform operations (Starling-Alves et al., 2021). Learners who experience anxiety tend to perform worse on assignments and during tests, resulting in a cycle of anxiety and lack of motivation to learn. Some students may not realize that they are misunderstanding fractions which can lead to them not correcting their thinking. 

Because of these challenges, it is important to not only teach fractions for conceptual understanding but to teach with a consideration of emotional engagement. From experience, using visual models, real-life examples and hands-on interactive activities can significantly increase student engagement and motivation which can improve understanding. By building conceptual learning and not simply having students memorize facts, we as teachers can reduce anxiety students have towards fractions and start building their confidence.