Maybe you have a few days left of school and your brain is fried. If so, let me give you four videos that introduce fractions, with multiple examples. If you’re out for the summer, bookmark or pin this page and come back to it when you’re doing your lesson plans for the fall. Future you will thank you.
Seriously, there’s more to fractions than pizza
I get it, who doesn’t like pizza, and it’s so easy to show how a pizza can be divided into fourths, eighths and so on. Still, I think we do our students a disservice when we only show fractions as a part of a shape. As adults, we know that you can have a fraction of the distance traveled, a fraction of the work done, a fraction of a pile of fish. As a teacher, I know that most students benefit from multiple examples. I also know that it’s important to teach terms, “What is a denominator?” So, here are 10 minutes of animated videos, with explanations, definitions and a range of examples.
Understanding fractions in 4 videos
- Understanding fractions – explains how Native American children could use fractions to keep track of time
- What is a half? – An explanation of what is a half, using multiple examples from travel to shapes.
- Is one-half fair? – How many times have you heard kids insist something wasn’t fair? This video uses fractions and the concept of one-half to determine if two people are doing the their fair share of the work, getting their fair share of a pile of blankets.
- What’s a numerator? What’s a denominator? – Parts of fraction explained with a pile of fish.
Would you rather have PowerPoints for Teaching Fractions?
Just say the word! We’re here to help. Find PowerPoints here for all the videos above and more. Feel free to download and modify as you see fit.