Fun With Fractions
And a Look Back At Previous Learning Experiences
Hello!
My kids are on mid-winter break this week. If your kiddos are, too, then I hope you are enjoying your break! Now that we are mid-way through the week, you might be looking for some activities to do with your kids. Look no further! I have some recommendations for some of my previous blog posts that you might want to check out. I also have a new activity that encourages your children to play with fractions!
Previous Learning Experiences To Try:
Do your kids like pirates? Check out my activities that go along with the movies Muppets Treasure Island and Blackbeard’s Ghost. I recommend Muppets for younger kids and Blackbeard for older kids.
Looking to do some cooking or baking over the break? Give Ratatouille or The Disney Magic Bake-Off a try.
Looking for Sci-Fi? Check out Toy Story or Flight of the Navigator. I recommend Toy Story for younger kids and Flight of the Navigator for older kids.
Want to focus more on nature? Try either A Bug’s Life or Honey, I Shrunk The Kids!
Now for Fun with Fractions!
Materials Needed:
-construction paper
-a plate or other circle to trace
-ruler
-pencil
-markers, crayons, colored pencils, or paints
-Play-Doh
If you are looking for a movie to connect this with, you can watch Toy Story (Pizza Planet!) with your children. You can also find pizza scenes in Inside Out and Soul.
Making Pizzas
Give your children construction paper, a ruler, and art supplies. Use a plate or other circle to trace circles on construction paper. Encourage your children to do the tracing and cutting. Divide the circles into equal parts using a ruler. If your child is older, have him or use a ruler to draw the lines. If your child is younger, you can draw the lines to divide create the fractions because it is very important that they be equal! You can divide the pizza into 2, 3, 4, 6, or 8 equal pieces.
If your child is younger, you can give them fractions to create. For my 6 year old, I told her the fractions I wanted made and she made them.
To make it a game, you can have your child pretend to be a waiter or waitress and take your order. You can tell your child how many toppings you want on how many pieces. For example, you can order a pizza with 2/4 pepperoni, 1/4 cheese, and 1/4 pepper. Explain to your child that this means that 2 out of 4 pieces need to have pepperoni, 1 out of 4 need to have cheese, and 1 out of 4 need peppers. Show your children how to write the fraction. In practicing they can discover that 2/4 is equal to 1/4 when looking at the pizza.
For older children you can have them make their own fractions and pizza types. You can even have them create a menu of different pizzas. This also can turn into play. Children can make their own pizza restaurant, complete with menu and many pizza options! Again children can see fractions and how 2/4 = 1/2, 4/8 = 1/2, and 2/8 = 1/4, all through playing with pizza!
You can do this same activity with Play-Doh!
If you want more practice with fractions, you can get little manipulatives like this for your child to play with. You can find them on Amazon and at Lakeshore Learning. You can even make them yourself! Again, it’s just important to make sure that all of the pieces are equal so your child can compare 2/4 to 1/2 and see that they are the same!
I hope one of these activities will be helpful for you and that you enjoy the rest of your break!
Until next time!
~Nicole