Paper Folding Fractions

I was working this morning with an MAT1L class who started a unit on fractions. The goal I set was to do a lot of work with unit fractions. We started by doing paper folding, which was quite challenging for some to get equal pieces.

We made connections that the more pieces we make, the smaller the size of the pieces, so the bigger the denominator the smaller the unit fraction.

We put the unit fractions on a number line.

Some students put a lot of fractions on their number line. Once they have well folded unit fractions they can really get a sense of comparison between fractions.

We looked at adding up unit fractions including what happens if we make improper fractions. There was some hesitation from the students to deal with anything larger than five one fifths. We had spent so much time living in the zone between 0 and 1 so this is understandable. We were able to show that 5 one fifths add up to 1, and then we’d have 2/5 left over so we have a mixed number 1 and 2/5.

I look forward to coming back later this week to explore more fraction fun with this class.