How to Help Students Learn 4th Grade Fractions

I was inspired recently to help my fellow teachers with an issue they were having. The schedule for our curriculum is restricting. There is no time for reteaching or absent students. Plus, all of these snow days have taken 8 days from this quarter!

Introducing my line of Independent Computer Center pages. Did your student miss your lesson on 4.NF.1? I have a file for that. Did your student just totally not “get” 4.NF.1? Use this file for teaching and reteaching in a way that doesn’t require your time! All you need is one computer per student (the computer does need to have Microsoft PowerPoint on it, as the file opens as a PPT Show).
This is what is included for each standard:

Here is what I do to set this up. There are 2 easy options so choose what works best for you.
Option 1: Save the file(s) to a flash drive. Each standard is saved as its own file to help you stay organized. Hand your student the flash drive and tell him/her which standard to access (such as 4.NF.5). As long as your students know how to access the files on the flash drive, this is probably the easiest way.
Option 2: If you tend to leave your classroom computers logged in to the same account all day every day (not my preference, but it works for some), then you can save the files to the desktop. You can then tell the students which file to access, or you can put it up on each computer for them. This would work great if you’re using station rotations during your math time. The file will stay on the screen until you (or someone) presses the esc button on the keyboard. No one will need to bother you about accidentally closing the website because it doesn’t close!

Here is the preview file for what you will get:

Just show your students once how to follow the arrows through the lesson. I have my students answer the 2 questions (in the yellow boxes) in their notebooks so I can check for understanding. This is my only involvement in these activities. Honestly, most of the videos teach the lesson better than I do anyway! Fractions are hard 🙂
So far I’ve done a Fractions unit, and a single page for 4.OA.4. I plan on doing units for all of 4th grade first, before working on 5th and maybe 3rd grade units too. If I do any for the primary grades it will be in a different format since they aren’t quite ready for this much time on task.
What unit(s) would you like to see next? Leave a comment with your suggestions and I will get to work. Thanks for reading and don’t forget to check out my Math Strategies Pinterest Board.

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