When students exercise shape flexibility in solving a math problem to enhance their understanding, or to figure out any hidden or nonobvious relationship between the known and unknown quantities, such as moving and rearranging parts of a bar model drawing or/and adding dotted lines to a model diagram.
It’s not surprising that those who practice spatial structuring stand a higher chance of solving a word problem when using the “draw a diagram” strategy than their peers who don’t.
by Numerati January 29, 2025