You punch in the numbers you want to add, subtract, multiply or whatever. You calculate the total of 3 and 4 and then the equals sign seems to mean ‘and the answer is…’ (complete with big trumpet fanfare). When many children look at this, what they’re seeing is ‘3 plus 4 gives me the answer 7. So often, it is thought of as another way of saying ‘find the answer’.įor example, look at the number sentence 3 + 4 = 7. I know first hand from teaching math that, very often, children don’t fully understand what the equals sign really means.
