[dtrabilsy]

I have a class that is not understanding basic division. Does anyone have any ideas at all on how I can get them to understand the concept?

[lv2read]

My students struggled with this as well. I used base ten blocks, tiles, coins and cookies. (Yeah, I broke down to the food element.) Ask the students to help you figure out how many containers, boxes, etc you will need for x amount of cookies. Tell the students that 4, 6 or 8 will fit in one container. The students will more than likely begin creating groups of 4, 6 or 8 until all the cookies are in a group. This lesson was one of our grades' concept lessons. The students loved it. The cookies were an incentive but they grasped the concept. This lesson also works well with remainders too and long division.

Be sure that the students know that each group has to have equal amounts.

[dtrabilsy]

Thanks...I have been using the manipulatives...they just aren't getting the whole picture. I will try the cookie idea today.

Try a real situation - like you are taking the class on a fieldtrip and have six cars that each hold three kids. Do you have enough cars?

[Mr. S]

Have you tried Daddy, Mommy, Sister, Cousin, Brother, Ricardo? Teach them Daddy=Divide, Mommy=multiply, Sister = subtract, Cousin=compare, Brother is bring down. Ricardo says bring up the remainder.
This works really well, but they need to really know their time tables, or division is hard. You can use manipulates for the basic understanding, but that is only good for small numbers, once the numbers get big, they need to know the process.

[jph]

I have a small banner with the question: "Does McDonald's Serve Cheese Burgers?" (Divide, Multiply, Subtract, Check, Bring down)
It's easy to remember and the kids love shouting it out when we have a division problem. If they know their multiplication facts and know the steps above, maybe division will be easier for them. Good luck!