Teaching Young Children About Fractions
Hands-on Activities to Help Teach Fractions
In the book, Count on Math: Activities for Small Hands and Lively Minds, Pam Schiller and Lynne Peterson define fractions to be: “…parts of a whole. Learning about fractions teaches children the concept that things can be divided evenly. They also learn that their one fourth of a cookie is the same amount as their friend’s one-fourth of a cookie, the concept that the same fractional parts are equivalent parts of a whole.”
Start Teaching Fractions
A child needs many hands on experiences with solids when learning fractions and should use vocabulary such as, divide, equal, parts, and share. Parents need to remind a child that fractions divide things up evenly. Giving hands on practice will help a child, who may be a visual learner, understand how to divide items equally.
Using solids that can be divided equally will allow a child to visually see how the object was evenly divided. It is important to have items that can be easily divided when teaching about fractions. Items such as: play dough, graham crackers, sandwiches, pizza, fruit, pancakes, egg cartons and construction paper can be used.
Parents can begin exploring fractions by teaching a child about the concept of symmetry. Using pictures from a magazine or paper cut outs of pictures, have the child fold the each picture in half and making sure the edges are evenly folded. If the picture is folded evenly then it means the picture can be divided fairly.
Some pictures should be able to be divided and others not. Examples of pictures are a sailboat, sandwich, orange, heart, Christmas tree, hand and car.
Provide scissors for the child to cut along the fold or line of symmetry. This will give the child two halves and will show, in a concrete way, the idea of what the concept of fractions means.
Hands On Fraction Activities
Can Everything Be Shared Equally Game:
Take items around the house that may be broken into two pieces and place them in a box. Items should include: a pretzel, play dough, an orange, egg carton and a cracker. Other items need to included that cannot be divided such as a plate, fork, rock, book, block, a plastic toy.
Ask the child each time if he or she thinks the item can be divided equally. Ask the child to show how they would divide the item into two halves. Allow him or her the opportunity to do so and place to the side and continue with the other items in the box.
Teaching Halves and Fourths:
Using two different colour pieces of construction paper, have the child cut one piece of paper in half along the line of symmetry. Glue the two halves onto the second piece of paper. Then with the remaining paper cut in half then in half and in half again to demonstrate fourths. Then glue on the paper with the already glued halves.
Extend the concept by showing the child how to write one half and one fourth in numerals. Parents can explain the top number is the numerator and the bottom is called the denominator.
Measuring Cups and Rice:
Place measuring cups and rice in a rectangle container. Encourage the child to show one cup of rice then a half-cup of rice. Ask the child how many half-cups are needed to fill one cup? Then move to one-fourth cup and continue the activity.
Reading Books About Fractions:
Visit the bookstore of the library and look for books about fractions. Here are two examples of wonderfully illustrated books to read with a child to help understand fractions. Give Me Half! by Stuart J. Murphy and G. Brian Karas [HarperCollins Publishers Inc, 1996] and Eating Fractions by Bruce McMillan [Scholastic Press, 1991].
Parents need to give a child as many hands on experience with fractions as possible. Showing a child how to divide a sandwich or a fruit equally or using measuring cups and filling the with rice are concrete ways a child can understand. Learning fractions by using hands on activities will give a child the much needed opportunities to make sense of this difficult math concept.
Schiller, Pamela Byrne. Count on Math: Activities for Small Hands and Lively Minds, MD: Gryphone House, Inc. 1997.
If you found this article helpful check out Teaching Number Concepts to Young Children by Jackie Parsons.
Teaching Young Children About Fractions
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Teaching Young Children About Fractions
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