126 Multiplication and Division Concepts
Successful Strategies
Students benefi t from engaging in fair shares division by
actually partitioning, not just watching someone partition. This
active learning helps students to build background experiences
and solidify their learning. Likewise, an illustration of
fair shares division should not replace actual experiences.
However, an illustration following the partitioning experience
serves as a benefi cial way to communicate the mathematics. To
make the division connections while students are partitioning
teachers should ask, “How many are in each group so far?”
and “How many more do you think each group will get?”
These questions and others help students strengthen their
understanding of division.fair shares, groups, sets,
remainder, divide, division,
dividend, divisor, quotientMath Words to Use
Questions at Different Levels of Cognitive Demand
Recall: What is the divisor?
Comprehension: How would you describe fair shares
division?
Application: When would you use fair shares to solve
a problem?
Analysis: How would you compare fair shares to
repeated subtraction?
Evaluation: In your judgement, is the fair shares
concept helpful? Why?
Synthesis: What kind of song could you create about
fair shares division?EASYCOMPLEX