Which property states that changing the grouping of three addends does not change the sum?

Which property states that changing the grouping of three addends does not change the sum?

• A. Associative Property of Addition
• B. Commutative Property of Addition
• C. Distributive Property
• D. Identity Property

Answer: (A)

Changing the grouping of three addends without changing the sum is the associative property of addition. It says that (a + b) + c equals a + (b + c), so the way you parenthesize three numbers doesn’t affect the total. For example, (2 + 3) + 4 equals 5 + 4 equals 9, and 2 + (3 + 4) equals 2 + 7 equals 9. The commutative property deals with reordering the addends, not regrouping, and the distributive property connects multiplication with addition, while the identity property involves adding zero. So regrouping doesn’t change the sum because of the associative property of addition.

Changing the grouping of three addends without changing the sum is the associative property of addition. It says that (a + b) + c equals a + (b + c), so the way you parenthesize three numbers doesn’t affect the total. For example, (2 + 3) + 4 equals 5 + 4 equals 9, and 2 + (3 + 4) equals 2 + 7 equals 9. The commutative property deals with reordering the addends, not regrouping, and the distributive property connects multiplication with addition, while the identity property involves adding zero. So regrouping doesn’t change the sum because of the associative property of addition.