While students often begin school with a single, operational meaning for the equal sign, they need to develop an additional three meanings to be successful in creating and using equations in school mathematics. In this presentation, we provide a model for expert understanding of the equal sign and describe how to help students in each of the grade bands PK-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12 move along the path to expert understanding. We illustrate this progression with tasks in each grade band that you can use to help your students improve their understanding of the equal sign.
