Egyptian fractions worksheet

Pupils can learn about fractions by doing divisions the Egyptian way! Your rating is required to reflect your happiness. It's good to leave some feedback. Something went wrong, egyptian fractions worksheet, please try again later.

When all identified resources have been successfully moved, this website will close. We expect this to be in June This unit has a brief look at what is known about Egyptian Fractions. These are unit fractions — fractions whose numerator is one. We look at how fractions can be represented in terms of Egyptian Fractions. Finally we suggest a web site that students might like to use as resource material for a small project. Students also practice adding and subtracting fractions, and looking for patterns.

Egyptian fractions worksheet

Or search by topic. Egyptian Fractions printable sheet. Instead they wrote fractions like these as a sum of different unit fractions. You can start by exploring unit fractions at Keep it Simple In this problem we are going to start by considering how the Egyptians might have written fractions with a numerator of 2 i. You might want to check that these are correct. If you can't see how these have been generated, take a look at Keep it Simple. Try some other fractions with a numerator of 2. Can they also be written as the sum of just two different unit fractions? You might like to take a look at a follow up problem, The Greedy Algorithm. Two brothers were left some money, amounting to an exact number of pounds, to divide between them.

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One goal of this task is to help students develop comfort and ease with adding fractions with unlike denominators. Another goal is to help them develop fraction number sense by having students decompose fractions. Because the Egyptians represented fractions differently than we do, it can also help students understand that there can be many ways of representing the same number. This helps prepare them for writing algebraic expressions in 6th grade. This task is an instructional task; the teacher may wish to supplement part b of the question in two directions:. In general, however, they used tables in order to break down fractions into sums of unit fractions.

One goal of this task is to help students develop comfort and ease with adding fractions with unlike denominators. Another goal is to help them develop fraction number sense by having students decompose fractions. Because the Egyptians represented fractions differently than we do, it can also help students understand that there can be many ways of representing the same number. This helps prepare them for writing algebraic expressions in 6th grade. This task is an instructional task; the teacher may wish to supplement part b of the question in two directions:. In general, however, they used tables in order to break down fractions into sums of unit fractions. One issue which comes up in the solution is that there are apparently many ways to write an Egyptian fraction.

Egyptian fractions worksheet

Or search by topic. This problem follows on from Keep it Simple. You could choose to set the scene briefly by asking students what they know about mathematics throughout history, establishing the idea that some historical maths is distinctly odd to our modern view point. Explain that the ancient Egyptians didn't write fractions with a numerator greater than 1 but expressed every fraction as the sum of different unit fractions. Any that can't be done can be written up on the board for the rest of the class to attempt.

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Let the class consider these questions in their groups. It will take a little more effort to see the first of the patterns above, and even more effort to see the second one. Working mathematically Thinking mathematically Mathematical mindsets. Report this resource to let us know if it violates our terms and conditions. Bring the class together and get them to discuss the conjecture. It's good to leave some feedback. This leads to an interesting question: how do you find the "best'' Egyptian fraction representing a given fraction? Again, for weaker students the pattern can be reinforced by doing some particular examples. Consider infinity in a new situation. If they think that they can see a pattern, get them to say what the pattern is and justify it. Egyptian Fractions Age 11 to Make a class conjecture. They might like to use the Egyptian Fractions in Copymaster 2. In other words it will eventually stop on a fraction with a numerator of one.

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Can we get an Egyptian Fraction representation this way too? Pupils can learn about fractions by doing divisions the Egyptian way! Consider infinity in a new situation. Session 4 In this session we look at how else we could apply the method of finding an Egyptian Fraction representation. In general, however, they used tables in order to break down fractions into sums of unit fractions. Hold onto this latter idea for a moment and give the students a chance to practice the method that we have shown above. Owen's Shop 4. First, we have a method of at least looking for an Egyptian Fraction representation of any fraction. Which fractions can be represented by three Egyptian Fractions? What sums did we get?