Illustrative Mathematics · Grade 6 · Unit 7 · Rational Numbers
Pack up for an expedition below zero! Find your way on the number line, compare cold temperatures and deep dives, measure distance from zero, stay inside safe limits, read the map grid in all four quadrants, and pack identical supply kits. Each station matches lessons from class. New to this? Learn it first →
Each station deals 8 fresh problems (Summit Push 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. Negative answers can be typed with a minus sign: −4, -4, or −2 1/2. Points are typed as two numbers, x first.
Signed numbers stay on friendly number lines: whole numbers, halves, and quarters. Temperatures, elevations, and bank balances are realistic, and points stay on a grid from −12 to 12. Factors and multiples use numbers up to 60. There is no adding or subtracting of negative numbers (that comes in Grade 7): distances are found by adding or subtracting distances from 0.
Hints use the tools from class: the number line (horizontal, or up and down for temperatures and sea level), brackets for distance from zero, graphs of inequalities, paths on the coordinate plane, and lists of factors and multiples. A used hint caps that problem at 5 points.
Reading −8 as greater than −3 because 8 is greater than 3, ordering numbers by their distance from zero, dropping the sign of a number below zero, a negative absolute value, “only 6” for numbers 6 from zero, an open circle read as closed, “at least” written as >, an inequality pointing the wrong way, the boundary counted as a solution of < or >, x and y swapped, a sign flipped for a point, subtracting distances across an axis, reflecting across the wrong axis, a smaller common factor for the greatest one, the product for the least common multiple, and mixing up which one a story needs.
The unit’s partner activities (info gaps and card sorts) and the open-ended drawing in Lesson 19 work better in class than as scored problems.