Flags
Three racing flags rate three students' approaches to adding 1/7 + 3/14: a clumsy common denominator, decimals, and a playful exploration of fractions as dates.
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Free for classrooms, worksheets, slides and other non-commercial use under CC BY-NC 4.0, with credit to Ben Orlin.
Cartoon by Ben Orlin, Math with Bad Drawings. https://cartoons.mathwithbaddrawings.com/2018-03-20-flags/ (CC BY-NC 4.0)Transcript
[Yellow Flag = Slow Down] Student: "I'm adding 1/7 + 3/14, so I used the common denominator 98..."
[Red Flag = Stop] Student: "I'm adding 1/7 + 3/14, so I converted both into decimals..."
[Checkered Flag = Victory] Student: "I'm adding 1/7 + 3/14, which is 5/14, but that looked to me like January 7th + March 14th = May 15th, so I started looking for fractions that work as dates too.." Teacher: "I love it when the students out-nerd me."