Topics: Starter | Fractions

• Transum,
•  
• Click on the small green button below the rectangle to see the shaded areas line up in the lower third of the diagram. Was that a revelation? A similar transformation can be applied to the circular pattern. Pupils could be challenged to devise a similar pattern that shows two fifths shaded. It would be wonderful to see what they come up with.
• Katie, Durham
•  
• The problem is that students can get the correct answer with a misconception by counting the number of shaded pieces out of the total number of pieces regardless of their size.
  
  [Transum: Thanks Katie. Maybe we should add that students have to explain how they got their answer. That might help highlight the misconception.]
• Jonathan Harrison, oaklands.ac.uk
•  
• Or unshade one of the shaded parts of the question.
• Steve, Erpingham Primary
•  
• Hi, I can't find the green button for the solution to the fractangles problem?
  
  [Transum: Sorry for the inconvenience Steve. The animation was originally written in Flash so it wouldn't work on certain devices and browsers. It has now been rewritten without using Flash so you should be able to see the green button just below and to the right of the rectangle.]
• Mrs Melono,
•  
• Interesting. My students got it very quickly.
• Dominique BODIN, France
•  
• Just add one or two segments would easily prevent the misconception pointed above without loosing the "unequal parts" aspect of the task.
  
  [Transum: Excellent idea Dominique. I have added the extra segments to the rectangle diagram but left the circle as it is for whole class discussion. Thanks.]

How did you use this starter? Can you suggest how teachers could present or develop this resource? Do you have any comments? It is always useful to receive feedback and helps make this free resource even more useful for Maths teachers anywhere in the world.
Click here to enter your comments.

Previous Day | This starter is for 10 August | Next Day