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Brick Playbook: Parent Edition
A Roll of the Brick
Complete fraction multiplication with the assistance of bricks.
Objective:
Child will be able to use bricks for beginning fraction multiplication.
Essential Question(s):
When multiplying whole numbers by a fraction, how can we visualize the mathematics?
Special Materials:
Dice, pencil and paper
Bricks Required:
1×2 or 2×2 bricks, 16×16 plates
Project Structure
Engage/Explain: Front-load fraction multiplication concepts.
Explore:
- Give child a handful of bricks, a 16×16 plate, and a pair of dice.
- Child rolls the dice to make a fraction, with smaller number on top, then notes it on their paper. If the fraction needs reducing, child should do so.
- Child rolls the dice again, adds the dice together to determine the whole number, and counts out that many bricks.
- Ask child to multiply their fraction by the whole number, using the bricks to create groups according to the denominator of the fraction (e.g., if the fraction is ⅘, child divides the bricks into five equal groups). If the bricks can’t be divided evenly by the denominator, the dice should be rolled again to get a new multiplicand.
