When students create a visual resource to scaffold problem-solving, they can approach independent work with more confidence ...

I heard this almost every day as a student when my teachers assigned math problems--odds in class, evens for homework--at the end of each section in the book. And many teachers still do this today.

For all of the recent strides we’ve made in the math world—like a supercomputer finally solving the Sum of Three Cubes problem that puzzled mathematicians for 65 years—we’re forever crunching ...