Task 2-3 Appropriate Use of Technology

The tool that I chose to use for the Appropriate use of Technology assignment, Task 2-3 from the Illuminations Website is called the “Fraction game”. It is listed under one of the Activities for students from 6th-8th grade.




Click here to play the game



The activity is designed to allow students to individually practice working with relationships among fractions and ways of combining fractions.



1. What mathematics does it teach or reinforce? Finding multiple paths to adding fractions together to get a desired result.
2. Is this effective? Absolutely! This is a great tool for students that shows that there is more than one way to add fractions together to get the same number. For instance if the desired result is to find all combinations listed that will add together to get 4/5. The sliding scale on the game will allow you to move the fifths marker to 3/5 and the tenths marker to 2/10, thus adding together to make 4/5. It would also allow you to slide the markers to 2/5 and 4/10 and so on.

3. Does the technology offer something that other tools would not? I think so, even though the scope of the tool is really just finding ways to add fractions together there aren’t many tools that are this easy to use that shows the different possibilities and values of adding these fractions.

4. Are there other effective ways to teach or reinforce this same content? Of course, this is only one way to practice adding fractions, probably not a tool you would use to initially teach how to add fractions together.

5. If you were to teach this same lesson, what might you change about the delivery or example(s)? I think specifically for this level, I might use a little more student friendly language when initially explaining the model. Also, I would want to also provide a way to subtract the fractions also to get the same desired result so that more extensive learning can happen when using the tool.