Bouck, E. C., Shurr, J., Bassette, L., Park, J., & Whorley, A. (2018). Adding it up: Comparing concrete and app-based manipulatives to support students with disabilities with adding fractions. Journal of Special Education Technology, 33(3), 194-206.
Who: Bouck and colleagues compared the use of digital manipulatives via iPad and the use of concrete manipulative to support students with disabilities with adding fractions. An adapted alternating treatment design, with three middle school students with disabilities, explored the accuracy, independence and completion time for fraction addition.
What: Fraction tiles is an iTunes application, created by Brainingcamp, available for download that provides color-coded tiles with lengths proportional to their values. Additionally, the digital manipulatives can display labels as fractions, decimals, or percents. Tiles can be easily moved and snapped together. Versatile enough for almost any fraction or decimal topic.
Why: The use of concrete manipulatives are considered evidence based in supporting students with and without disabilities’ learning. Manipulatives can aid in making abstract concepts more concrete. The article sought to address the limited research on concrete and virtual manipulatives.
Cost: $1.99
Resources: This link will give examples of the different math instruction support available in fraction tiles: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX28EaoFZXUYhd9ImUOuvPQ