Conducting research to help close gaps in student performance, I read a great deal of research on how to best teach word problems with my students. The research showed that explicitly teaching word problem types and the drawings that accompany them, in addition to teaching reading skills with story problems are better at increasing student performance on word problems than teaching keyword identification.

These numberless word problems focus your students on the task of identifying the various word problem types. Because they are numberless, students focus more on the words and situations in the problem, rather than on trying to solve them.

Use for who group discussion, small groups, and as a sorting activity, you and your students can increase their recognition of word problems and be one step closer to increasing their accuracy in solving them.