Rita is adding 3 (negative 8) 1. She rewrites the expression as 3 (negative 1) 8. What is Rita’s error? She used the commutative
property, which cannot be used with negative numbers. In the new expression, –8 and 1 should both be negative. She used the associative property which should only be used with positive numbers.. She switched the negative signs for –8 and 1.
