NUMBERS • FRACTIONS 41

The dividing line

can be straight

or slanted

The bottom number,

or denominator,

shows the number

of parts the whole

is divided into

The top number, or

numerator, tells us how

many parts of the

whole we have

This shows the

original cake,

divided into

FOUR parts

It means that each slice is ONE

part out of the original cake,

which was divided into FOUR parts.

We write a fraction as the number

of parts we have (the numerator)

over the total number of parts (the

denominator).

This shows the

robot’s ONE

slice of cake

FIVE-SEVENTHS ARE PINK

TWO-THIRDS

OF A CAKE

ONE-FIFTH ONE-SIXTH ONE-SEVENTH ONE-EIGHTH ONE-NINTH ONE-TENTH

This time, there

are seven cakes

and five are pink. So,

five-sevenths of the

cakes are pink.

(^5) ⁄ 7 of the cakes are pink,
so^2 ⁄ 7 of them are blue
Non-unit fractions
can be parts of
a whole, too. This
shows two-thirds of
a cake that’s been
divided into three.
The cupcake has been
divided into thirds
A fraction can be part of one thing,
like half a pizza, or part of a group,
like half the students in a class.
1
5
1
6
1
7
1
8
1
9
1
10
2
5 3
7
1
4

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