Addition of Whole Numbers with Regrouping using the “Soroban”

Addition is one of the basic Arithmetic skills which all pupils must be able to do. Many, pupils can do addition but there are others who face difficulties to solve addition with regrouping problems. This paper describes the experience of a teacher who used the Soroban (Japanese abacus) as a tool to help two of his students who faced difficulties with addition of whole numbers with regrouping to aid them to do the addition problems. The study involves two Year 4 Primary school pupils in an urban school who were able to do addition without regrouping but were unable to do addition with regrouping. The two pupils were selected from two classes based on their low score in the pre-test.