Out of the three fractions 2/3, 5/6, or 5/9, which is the largest quantity? Teaching Nessa to compare fractions with different denominators, I resorted to a story involving two wizards sent to resolve an argument between three girls who had each been given a pie: an apple pie baked by a human queen, a daisy-petal pie baked by little flower fairies, and a huge pumpkin pie baked by giants. After these three girls had each cut up their pies into a different number of pieces and placed a few pieces onto plates for themselves, they inexplicably got into an argument over who had taken the greatest portion of their pie out of the pan. One wizard foolishly tried to help by measuring and weighing the pieces on the plate. The other wizard said that they should find a larger number of equal pieces into which they could cut each of their pies. Then they could easily resolve their dispute by simply counting the number of pieces on their plate versus the number of pieces remaining in their pie pan. By the end of this story, Nessa was solving problem after problem of this type with no trouble. Facetious conclusion: clearly this is the way to approach instruction in this particular skill area.
Posted on: Sat, 25 Oct 2014 21:14:04 +0000
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