Creating Division Stories

New York State Common Core Math Grade 6, Module 2, Lesson 5

Worksheets for Grade 6

Lesson 5 Student Outcomes

• Students demonstrate further understanding of division of fractions when they create their own word problems.
• Students choose a measurement division problem, draw a model, find the answer, choose a unit, and then set up a situation. Further, they discover that they must try several situations and units before finding which are realistic with given numbers.

Lesson 5 Summary

The method of creating division stories has five steps, to be followed in order:
Step 1: Decide on an interpretation (measurement or partitive). Today we used only measurement division.
Step 2: Draw a model.
Step 3: Find the answer.
Step 4: Choose a unit.
Step 5: Set up a situation. This means writing a story problem that is interesting, realistic, short, and clear and that has all the information necessary to solve it. It may take you several attempts before you find a story that works well with the given dividend and divisor.

Classwork
Opening Exercises
The classwork and problem sets from Lessons 1 through 4 include visual models made by the students. These will serve as the first three steps in writing division stories about the problems. These include fraction bars, number lines, and area models. Examples are shown here:
Fraction bar:
8/9 ÷ 2/9

Number Line:
Molly’s friend Xavier purchased 11/8 cups of strawberries, and he eats 3/4 cup servings. How many servings has he purchased?

Area Model:
3/5 ÷ 1/4

Example 1
In this example, students reason abstractly and quantitatively. They make sense of quantities and their relationships in problems and understand “how many” as it pertains to the divisor when finding the quotients of fractions.
1/2 ÷ 1/8

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Example 1
1/2 ÷ 1/8

Use the following steps to help you create division stories.
Step 1: Decide on an interpretation.
Step 2: Draw a model.
Step 3: Find the answer.
Step 4: Choose a unit.
Step 5: Set up a situation.

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Solution Set
Solve.

1. How many sixteenths are in 15/16?
2. How many 1/4 teaspoon doses are in 7/8 teaspoon of medicine?
3. How many 2/3 cups servings are in a 4 cup container of food?
4. Write a measurement division story problem for 6 ÷ 3/4.
5. Write a measurement division story problem for 5/12 ÷ 1/6.
6. Fill in the blank to complete the equation. Then, find the quotient and draw a model to support your solution.
   a. 1/2 ÷ 5 = 1/□ of 1/2
   b. 3/4 ÷ 6 = 1/□ of 3/4
7. 4/5 of the money collected from a fundraiser was divided equally among 8 grades. What fraction of the money did each grade receive?
8. Meyer used 6 loads of gravel to cover 2/5 of his driveway. How many loads of gravel will he need to cover his entire driveway?

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