0"PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS

The purpose of this study was to assess children's and adults ' quantitative understanding of fractions in a new and potentially definitive way, and to determine whether this understanding was related to fraction computational skill. Thirty-seven seventh graders and 32 adults (college students) participated in the study. A computation task was used to classify subjects as "good " or "poor " at fraction computation. An estimation task was used to classify the same subjects as "good " or "poor " at understanding fraction size. If such understanding is important to learning or remembering fraction computation rules, subjects would be expected to be "good " or "poor " at both. The study indicated that a quantitative notion of fractions was only one of the variables determining fraction computational skill. (RH) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document