Winter Games Fractions

In my third grade class we're currently working on fractions.  At this point in the year, we're really working on comparing fractions with like and unlike denominators, and equivalent fractions.  It's hard for students to grasp both concepts, and I know that when I was growing up, I was most definitely of guilty of just drawing dividing lines haphazardly to prove what I wanted.

I had the idea to use the medals from the Winter Games to help be a basis for a daily review.

Each day, this chart will be updated.  It showed the medal totals from this morning.  I put the USA on the top because that's what we're looking at most often.  We will then use those totals as the basis for our daily fraction conversations.

We may look at the fractions for each medal for a country.

We could also then use it to compare fractions. If 2/5 of America's medals are gold, and 3/7 of the Netherland's medals are gold, who has the bigger ratio of gold medals?

If things go the right way, one could only hope, we could also use the medal totals for equivalence.  We just need to play it by ear each day.

For my kiddos, their answers are part of their morning routine for the next couple weeks.  They come in, sign in, and then turn in a quarter sheet with their answer.  All correct answers earn them 1 Smarty Pants point on our Class Dojo system.   They love earning points- especially the Smarty Pants points.

Because I know not all of our followers are from the U.S., I made coordinating sheets for Canada and a blank one if you'd like to list another country.  I also included recording sheets for using the chart to explore more and less or if you're graphing the medal totals each day.  There really are many different ways you can use it.

To download the free recording sheets, just click the image below.

Don't forget, we're featuring different freebies each day this week to help you incorporate the Games in your classroom!  Also, check out the great products below!