Stage 1 fractions and decimals
Strategies
Students can:
- use folding and sharing diagrams to represent fractions
- use half and quarter to describe equal parts
Activities to support the strategies
1. Students are given some paper rectangles and fold each rectangle to show halves. Discuss whether the parts are equal.
Students label the parts of the rectangle. Students then turn the paper over and fold the paper into quarters and label.
Students can repeat the activity using:
- circle shapes such as pikelets, cakes, paper circles or paper plates
- columns or bars including chocolate or lamingtons.
2. Students are given some paper circles to represent cupcakes or cookies. Pose these problems:
- If we wanted to share 4 (or 6) cupcakes between 2 people, how could we do it? Students use the paper circles to model the strategies they would follow.
- If we wanted to share 3 (or 5) cupcakes between 2 people, how could we do it? Students model the strategies using the paper circles and also by drawing a diagram to show the strategies.
Students describe their sharing diagrams to the class, using the terms ‘halves’ or ‘half’.
3. Provide students with a selection of cards. Students determine if the shaded part of each shape shows one half, less than one half or more than one half.
Students colour parts of a square using the Fraction Paint interactive program. (Refer to the Fraction Paint links under Student resources below.)
4. The teacher cuts different sized round fruits (e.g. oranges or apples) into halves or quarters. The students then select the pieces that are needed to remake the fruit.
Students describe the steps they followed to remake the fruit using the terms ‘halves’ and ‘quarters’.
Make collections of objects using centicubes or pencils. Students share the collections equally into two groups and into four groups. Observe the strategies the students use to share equally.
References
Australian curriculum
ACMNA033: Recognise and interpret common uses of halves, quarters and eights of shapes and collections
NSW syllabus
MA1-7NA: Represents and models halves, quarters and eighths; MA1-1WM: Communicating
Resources
Fraction worksheets