Key stage 1 maths - a fraction question.

[FrustratedSycamoresRocks]

They don't need to simplify the answer do they? (Dc is 7) is it as simple as:

There are 6 cats, 4 are black, 2 are white,
What fraction of cats are white?

It's 4/6 isn't it?

Am I right in thinking that at this stage they don't need to simplify to 1/3?

Isn't it 2/12? Or 1/6 simplified?

D'oh too much staring at computer screen today I think! Yes, 2/6 is correct.

I would accept either 2/6 or 1/3

6 cats altogether, 2 are white so it's 2/6. I wouldn't think they would need to simplify.

Duh, I got it wrong writing it down.

Yeah I meant 2/6, not simplified to 1/3

Thinking it is literally how many cats all together as the base number, and the number of white cats as the top number.

Dd says she hasn't done fractions yet (not too sure on her reliability on that, but she's in yr2, and this is advanced h/w)

I dont want to over complicate it for her if I dont need to.

Surely they wouldn't send home fraction homework if she hasn't done fractions yet?

If she understands the 2/6 easily then I'd probably explain the 1/3 thing too, depends on her maths understanding really

They sent a test paper home that had a fraction question in it iyswim, rather than fractions homework.

My dc, aged 7 is always being sent home with homework based on stuff they haven't done at school. Division, time telling, multiplication. It's a nightmare and I see little point in us trying to teach her something she hasn't been taught at school.

Its 2/6 which simplified is 1/3

Hi FrustratedSycamoresRocks:

You have got the problem's answer correct - 2 out of 6 cats are white - so expressed as a fraction that is 2/6 which is = 1/3.

It may help to do this visually with a sheet of paper.

Fold it into thirds (like you'd fold a sheet of A4 for a letter). Cut along two lines (you now have 3 long strips) - and cut each strip in half. Shade 2 of the square black (for the two black cats) and leave the rest. Or print out pictures of white & black cats & glue them on.

Now law them out - you should have 4 squares of white and 2 squares of black. A fraction is just expressing how many out of all the squares ( in this case we're examining colour of cats).

Now - in terms of visually showing reducing - as your DC if there is another way to arrange the squares - hopefully they'll hit upon pairs. But, you may need to gently encourage them to see that 2, 4 and 6 are all even numbers divisible by 2 (or that can be halved - often kids get halving before they get dividing by 2).

Arrange the squares into pairs. So two white squares (pair #1), another two white squares (pair #2) and two black squares (pair #3). Visually you can see you have 3 pairs - 2 white pairs and 1 black pair. So in terms of how many pairs of white cats do we have now = 2 out of 3 pairs of cats or 2/3.

HTH

Sorry I've now got my numbers mixed and it should be 4 squares black and 2 squares white from the sheet cutting instructions & pairs work.

Sorry dashed off in haste

PSBD

Ds -also Yr2 - told me they hadn't done fractions yet.

I had a quick look at his maths book the other day and it appears he has!

Perhaps they haven't called it 'fractions' as such, but his table have certainly done similar things to that Q and introduced the idea this term.