Fraction, Decimal, Percent Fold it Up

Fraction, Decimal, Percent Fold it Up for Middle School Math

2/11/2015

$Try this fun, free, fold it up to help your math students with their fraction, decimal, percent conversions. Great for their interactive notebooks!$ Click to download.

Do your middle school math students have difficulty with their fraction, decimal, percent conversions? Mine often do, but I have a few ways to help them try to keep the concepts straight.

Tools for Teaching Fraction, Decimal, Percent Conversions:
We started our Percent Unit last week and began the unit with converting between fractions and percents and decimals. I had already made the fraction, decimal, percent number line (a free resource in me store) for them with the most common fractions, percents, and decimals, but I figured there was a need for a "foldable" to keep all of the "rules" for converting in one place.

We have already worked on converting decimals to fractions and fractions to decimals, but somehow, as we add new concepts, the students forget how to do these things! It's funny - my team teachers and I never write percents on students' papers any more, but always write their grades as fractions, like 18/23. From the first week of school, we teach the students how to change these fractions into their percentages, and every time they get a graded paper back, they are to find their percentages. So, when we say "Figure out your grade," they can do it. BUT, in math class, if I ask them to change 18/23 to a percent, they just look at me. When I give them the hint, "Pretend it's your grade," they look at me, understanding dawning on their faces! Why do they need that cue? Hmmm.....always a question.

$Try this fun, free, fold it up to help your math students with their fraction, decimal, percent conversions. Great for their interactive notebooks!$ Click to download.

Anyway, to keep the conversion rules all in one place, we made this "fold it up." The Fraction, Decimal, Percent tabs (triangles) each get cut in half, and have a different rule and example under each half.

I'm so glad we made these last week, because our schedule has been screwy for the past few school days! Thursday and Friday we had early dismissal due to parent-teacher conferences, so all math classes didn't meet both days; and today, we had a two hour delay, so all classes were short. The "fold it up" was super-handy as we had to work pretty quickly today! And hopefully, they've used it to help them with their homework tonight...