Week 3: Making New Units with Place Values

 Hello! Welcome to Week 3 of my blog entry. 

Tonight, I reviewed how to "make new units" using place values. 

In 4th Grade, it appears that exploring the relationships which exist between numbers is a big emphasis. 

Students must understand that a dime is equal to 10 pennies, and a a dollar is equal to 10 dimes. 

The homework I assigned my students includes two word problems which encourage them to use multiplication skills and place values to decode units of numbers. 

For example, the below word problem states that since 1 dollar is worth 10 times as much as 1 dime, then 5 dollars must be worth 5 times as much as 5 dimes. In actuality, 5 times 5 dimes is half the amount of 5 dollars. One would need 50 dimes in order to have an amount equal to 5 dollars. 

Students review 3rd Grade math asking for the area of a garden with a length of 7ft and a width of 6ft. 

As 4th Grade teachers, it's important when asking these questions to encourage that students respond with the correct language and units of measurement. If a student writes 42 as an answer, and does not specify that it is actually an area of 42ft, then that would be considered an incomplete response. 

This kind of intentional thinking is elemental in 4th Grade and as teachers, it's our job to foster this high standard and reward students who rise to the occasion.