The Virginia State Supervisor for Learning Disabilities interviews Rose Sinicrope concerning the development of her finger subtraction strategy for use with learning-disabled students. Several examples of subtraction problems are illustrated to demonstrate the finger counting method, and this method is compared to the strategies of Chisanbop and…

Several ideas for questions and settings for interviews are presented. It is noted that although subtraction is used as an example in each case, most of the material can be easily adapted to the other basic operations. Many problems are noted with standard diagnostic tests and use of them is discouraged. (MP)

Explores mathematical methods children use to find answers for themselves. Describes some methods used for multiplication and subtraction problems. (YP)