An exploratory study on strategies and errors of a student with autism spectrum disorder when solving partitive division problems

Resumen

In recent years there has been an increasing interest in studying the academic performance of students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Among school subjects, mathematics is one of the great obstacles that face students with ASD. It is therefore crucial to go in depth into the understanding that they develop on mathematical concepts, to later provide learning instructions adapted to their needs. This paper explores the strategies and errors that an 11-year old student diagnosed with ASD shows when solving partitive division word problems. A teaching sequence has been designed that includes problems in two different formats: with and without support material. The data was collected during 15 one-hour sessions in which the student solved a total of 49 problems. Results show a clear preference for the one-to-many correspondence strategy in the problems with support material whereas the student mainly resorted to the sharing one-by-one strategy when he did not have the material. A list of errors has been identified related to the meaning of the notions of partition, equity and representativeness, required in partitive division word problems.