Reply To: 1-5 – Relating Fractions, Decimals, and Percents – Discussion

[Heidi Warrington]

My big takeaway was how rich the visuals were. In American math past grade 6, we often think of explaining fraction to decimal conversion either as writing an equivalent fraction with a base 10 denominator (ie 2/5 = 4/10 so 0.4 or 1/4 = 25/100 so 0.25) or just doing the long division (ie 2 divided by 5 is 0.4). Using the visual model, in particular the example showing why 1/4 is the same as 0.25, was really quite eye-opening to me! I’m wondering what the best balance is for middle school students when working with fractions, decimals, and percents. Should visuals always be part of the curriculum at this grade level or at a certain point, do we as teachers assume (as is common now) that students are ready to just deal with the abstract?