Lesson 3

Interpreting Division Situations

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Lesson Narrative

In an earlier lesson, students were reminded of the connection between multiplication and division. They revisited the idea of division as a way to find a missing factor, which can either be the number of groups, or the size of one group. 

In this lesson, students interpret division situations in story problems that involve equal-size groups. They draw diagrams and write division and multiplication equations to make sense of the relationship between known and unknown quantities (MP2).


Learning Goals

Teacher Facing

  • Create an equation and a diagram to represent a multiplication or division situation involving fractions, and coordinate these representations (orally).
  • Explain (using words and other representations) how to find the unknown quantity in a multiplication or division situation involving fractions.
  • Interpret a verbal description of a multiplication situation (in spoken or written language), and identify which quantity is unknown, i.e., the number of groups, the amount in one group, or the total amount.

Student Facing

Let’s explore situations that involve division.

Learning Targets

Student Facing

  • I can create a diagram or write an equation that represents division and multiplication questions.
  • I can decide whether a division question is asking “how many groups?” or “how many in each group?”.

CCSS Standards

Building On

Building Towards

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