Thursday, November 7, 2013

Workshop Wednesday... a little late

I am linking up with Jivey's blog.


This week's topic is fractions.
Love 'em or hate 'em, the kids have to learn 'em!

Teaching 5th grade there are two challenges with fractions.
They don't have concepts for small fractional parts and there are a lot of rules/ processes.

I came up with the most ingenious idea.

What if I could replicate the thinking process for each problem with a generic flow chart!

Click here to get a Goole doc version.

This chart is meant ONLY to address the adding and subtracting process.
It assumes the students already know about equivalent fractions.
It doesn't talk about simplifying fractions.  (That's a 'whole 'nother beast' as the saying goes.)

I know this isn't a pretty version but it is doing the trick for my kids.
One student who has struggled for days told me today, "Fractions are easy."

Great!  I didn't want them to be difficult!

EmilyK

2 comments:

  1. That's a great idea!! Unfortunately for us, we are still learning what fractions ARE (grrrrr), but this is great for those that are further along! Thanks for linking up!
    Jivey

    ReplyDelete