Teaching Decimals: 3 Ideas for Making Real-World Connections
I LOVE teaching decimals.
Why? Well, whether we are comparing, ordering, adding, subtracting, multiplying, or dividing decimals, there are so many fun ways to tie decimal skills into the real world. Teaching decimals with real-world connections worksheets is an engaging and effective way to help your students master these concepts.
If my students love Roblox… we are “buying” Roblox gift cards. Sports fans? We calculate and comparing batting averages. If there’s a major holiday coming up, we are going “shopping” for everything holiday related!
It’s so easy to make these skills FUN for students.
Go Grocery Shopping!
Provide students with a shopping list that includes various items with different prices. Ask them to calculate the total cost of the items, including tax, and make decisions based on a budget. This activity helps reinforce addition, subtraction, and multiplication with decimals. My students LOVE activities like these. They see their grownups shopping for groceries often, so it’s a familiar concept for most students. We invented “MathMart” in the classroom and we use the flyers and food items to bring this concept to life.
Plan a Vacation!
I am in love with planning vacations – what to do…what to do…
Now. In reality, we can only take so many vacations with 4 kids 8 and under. So, I settle for living in the dream and allowing my math students to practice planning their dream vacations. This allows them to use multiple skills including reasoning, planning, decimal operations, and more. Check out this “Snow Land Adventure” getaway activity!! So much (standards-aligned fun)!
What's the Weather?
Another fun way to tie decimals into the real world and how it relates to different occupations is by having your students become “weatherman” or “weatherwoman” for a day. They can choose a region, calculate rain (or snow) totals and compare those to other regions (other students). It’s fun, engaging, and gets students thinking about how math might be useful when they grow up!
Happy Teaching!
xo, Kristin @ The Pixie Dust Classroom