Illustrative Mathematics · Grade 6 · Unit 4 · Dividing Fractions
Run the workshop! Cut boards into pieces, fill cans part of the way, find what a whole batch takes, tile a floor, and pack crates with small cubes. Each station matches lessons from class. New to this? Learn it first →
Each station deals 8 fresh problems (Big Build deals 10). A right answer on the first try earns 10 points. After a wrong answer, the game names the likely mistake and gives one more try for 5 points.
Answers can be typed as a fraction (14/3), a mixed number (4 2/3), or a decimal close enough (4.67). On a phone, the answer box opens the full keyboard so the slash and space are there.
Denominators stay at 12 or less, and the numbers met along the way stay small, so the challenge is the idea: what the groups are, what is known, and whether to multiply or divide.
Hints use the pictures from class: tape diagrams cut into equal parts with the groups bracketed, a group cut into parts when part of it is known, rectangles tiled in small squares, and boxes packed with small cubes. A used hint caps that problem at 5 points.
Multiplying instead of dividing, dividing the wrong way, flipping the wrong fraction (or both), reading a leftover as a fraction of a whole instead of a fraction of a group, dropping the leftover, finding one part instead of the whole, forgetting the ½ in a triangle, and mixing up a count of small cubes with the volume.
Lesson 17 (Fitting Boxes into Boxes) is a hands-on project, and Lesson 12’s info gap is a partner activity, so both work better in class than as scored problems.