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Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 2:28 pm
by Azure
DC had following question. All the others he could find equivalent fractions for but this stumped him. I told him to find the decimal, which worked but got into some fiddly long division I did not think a year 6 would be asked to do. Is there another way to find out this answer?

Which is bigger 1/3 or 24/32

Any help can you offer?

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 2:42 pm
by yoyo123
If you reduce 24/32 to 3/4 , it makes it much easier to compare them. (think of that proportion of a circle coloured in)

You can convert both to 12ths

1/3 =4/12 3/4 = 9/12

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 3:15 pm
by Azure
O ok yoyo123. Thank you. I think he is not used to simplifying one down and the other up. I will tell him to look out for all options. Thank you.

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 3:35 pm
by moved
This one is a nice proportion question too - 1/3 is less than a half and 24/32 is more than a half.

It is good to get children to think of what the numbers represent as this will help with future ordering questions.

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 3:49 pm
by Azure
Yes that is actually how he got his answer but I wanted him to know how to work it out and it was getting so fiddling.

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 5:23 pm
by parent2013
Azure wrote:DC had following question. All the others he could find equivalent fractions for but this stumped him. I told him to find the decimal, which worked but got into some fiddly long division I did not think a year 6 would be asked to do. Is there another way to find out this answer?

Which is bigger 1/3 or 24/32

Any help can you offer?

1/3 means 11/33
Any day 24 out of 33 is better (bigger) than 24 out of 32.

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 5:29 pm
by southbucks3
They want him to simplify the second fraction rather than find a common denominator. :D

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2014 6:51 pm
by moved
In my recent assessments of yr 6 children many of them converted all fractions in an ordering task rather than 'looking' and using common sense to eliminate the obvious candidates.

For a question where the fractions are obviously smaller / larger children should think before they automatically start to calculate. Reasoning is a vital mathematical skill.

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Tue Oct 14, 2014 7:28 am
by UKGarfield
If your DC doesn't want to simplify the fraction or find a common denominator, one can simply cross-multiply.

Numerator of first fraction (1) x denominator of second fraction (32) = 32, assign this number to fraction which numerator is used (1/3)
Numerator of second fraction (24) x denominator of first fraction (3) = 72, assign this number to fraction which numerator is used (24/32)

the bigger the product, the bigger the value of the fraction, which is 24/32 in this case!

Hope this helps. :D

Note: this method works for comparing two fractions at a time.

Re: Year 6 fractions

Posted: Tue Oct 14, 2014 9:16 am
by Guest55
UKGarfield - your suggested 'method' is not appropriate for this question.

This question is designed to see who can spot one is bigger than a half and the other isn't; it's a great question! It really tests understanding not remembering a method.