Often algebra problems are abstract and we have seen in this demonstration that people strugglewith abstract problems. This demonstration has also shown us that people find problems easierto deal with when they can relate them to their own experiences. You could advise your friendthat when solving an abstract problem they should try replacing the abstract variables withthings with which they are familiar. For instance, if your friend is given the problem 6a=36 andthey are asked to solve for a, they might what to think of the question in terms of how manytouchdowns a football team needs to score to get 36 points