Fraction Fun

by David A. Adler, Nancy Tobin (Illustrator)

Would you rather eat 1/4 of a pizza or 1/8 of a pizza? Find 3/4 of a dollar or 1/10 of a dollar? Confused? You don't have to be! Fractions are made easy in this simple and hands-on math concept book. You'll learn what the top and bottom numbers are called, and what they mean. You will also find out how to recognize and compare different fractions. Just follow the clear instructions and you will learn the most important thing of all -- that fractions can be fun!

Genres: Mathematics, Picture Books, Nonfiction, Number, Childrens, School, 1st Grade

32 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

David Abraham Adler is an American children's author. He was born in New York City, New York in 1947. He graduated from Queens College in 1968 with a bachelor's degree in economics and education. For the next nine years, he worked as a mathematics teacher for the New York City Board of Education, while taking classes towards a master's degree in marketing, a degree he was awarded by New York University in 1971. In that same year, a question from his then-three-year-old nephew inspired Adler to write his first story, A Little at a Time, subsequently published by Random House in 1976. Adler's next project, a series of math books, drew on his experience as a math teacher. In 1977, he created his most famous character, Cam Jansen, originally featured in Cam Jansen and the Mystery of the Stolen Diamonds, which was published that year.

Adler married psychologist Renee Hamada in 1973, and their first child, Michael, was born in 1977. By that time Adler had taken a break from teaching and, while his wife continued her work, he stayed home, took care of Michael, and began a full-time writing career.

Adler's son, Michael S. Adler, is now the co-author of several books with his father, including A Picture Book of Sam Adams, A Picture Book of John Hancock, and A Picture Book of James and Dolly Madison. Another son, Edward, was the inspiration for Adler's Andy Russell series, with the events described in the series loosely based on adventures the Adler family had with Edward's enthusiasm and his pets.

As of November 2008, Adler has three sons and two grandsons. He lives in Woodmere, New York.

(source: Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Alistair Parker · Rating 1 out of 5]

it tell me about fractions The thing that I did not lie about it is my dad want me to read the book

[Rita · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book to introduce fractions. This book also has hands on activities for the students. Also this books makes fractions look fun. There are a lot of examples that use pizza and other items the students will be excited to see.

[Olivia Bailey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a great re-freshener to learning fractions. It teaches about fractions, adding fractions, money, and weight.
The pizza math of fractions is a perfect illustrations to how to take fractions of a whole.

[Shayla Diaz · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this book. If I would have known I would have used this book for the last topic that my students and I did. I teach 3rd grade and we work on comparing fractions with either the denominator the same or the numerator the same so some of the experiments in the book would have been great to use with the students such as taking a paper plate and marking in in half, fourths, and eighths so the students can actually see what happens when the number on the bottom gets bigger. These things would have helped my students to see those concepts. I also like how they talk about equal fraction with the students which is another concept that we address in 3rd grade. I will need to write myself a note in order to get this book to help with those concepts this next year with my students.

[Logan Marshall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Genre: Informational Nonfiction
Grade: 2-3
I really like this book because of the way it teaches fractions and fun and simple way. It gives really good visuals that show fractions are all around us in every day life. This would be a great book to have in the classroom that would show kids how to learn about fractions. I think this is a book for second third grade because that is around the time they start to learn fractions and it will help them a lot.

[Emmy Kirkham · Rating 4 out of 5]

Genre: Informational Nonfiction
Grade Level: 1-3

I thought this was a fun way for kids to learn about fractions! I know how boring and difficult math can seem, so books such as this one are super helpful to get students engaged in what they're learning, as well as relating their math to their lives. I thought the colorful drawings and fun hands-on projects added to this. Overall, this was a fun teaching book that I could see myself using in my classroom.

[Harry Griffin]

This is a great read for young students. This book could be a great additional resource for Math teachers. The book gives insight on different aspects of fractions. It will allow students to see pictures of familiar items that are divided into different fractions.

[Beth (FebruaryFilly) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one prescribes hands on ‘experiments’ to understand fractions by weight and uses money to explain equivalent fractions. This one feels like a younger precursor to fractions compared to Working with Fractions.

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has beautiful illustrations. It is a great book to use to introduce fractions in a fun and interesting way. I would read it as an introduction to a unit on fractions.

[Diana Valdivia-Rodriguez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book to introduce grades 4-5 into learning about fractions.

[Viviane Elbee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good explanation of fractions along with activities for kids in elementary school.

[Gala]

This is a good book to introduce fractions to 4th graders.

[Anna Nipert · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a wonderful children's book that brings math to life. It explains all the basics about fractions in a fun way!

[Perla Flores Pineda · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun way to begin a lesson about fractions!

[Marilyn Showalter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Informational
K-2nd grade reading level
I loved this book. It is such a fun book to teach kids about fractions. It is very interactive and would be an awesome book to use in a lesson on fractions or money. Who knew that words and numbers could come together so well to create a book that makes numbers look super cool.

[Julie · Rating 3 out of 5]

2nd-4th grade

Math

I liked that this book included hands-on activities, but I wish there had been more "book" to it before they got to the activities. I think that it would have benefited from including more about where we see fractions in every day life. But I really liked the paper plate activity to show fractions and I would definitely use that in a class to show fractions. I liked that they showed fractions in other ways than pizza and round shapes, as well.

I would use this in a classroom, probably second or third grade, while teaching fractions. I think it is a good introduction to fractions for kids just starting out. Before reading it, and then again after reading it, I would ask kids for other ideas about where to find fractions in real life. I would definitely do the paper plate activity, but I'm not sure I really liked the activity with the scale. That seems like an activity that would more clearly explain decimals, to me. I would definitely be selective about which parts I read and which activities we did, but I do think this is a good book to include.

[Annette Ruane · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a hands on math concept book that helps kids understand fractions while relating them to real life situations. This book also gives kids activities to do at home while they read along! Giving the readers actual activities is awesome way to have the reader engaged and learning and having fun! I like this book because the pictures were colorful and it does an awesome way of explain the concept of fractions. Another reason to why I chose this text was because it was a book that the kids could really be engaged with. They can do the activities and check their answer with the teacher. This text can help build your knowledge on fractions. Fractions are a tricky concept to grasp but this text has a new way of explaining fractions on each page. I like how the book related fractions to objects the kids could understand, like pizza or money, as well as giving the readers an activity to do. I would use this in my class room as group activities to introduce fractions.

[jenee tuggle]

d) Text-to Teaching Connection: What is a response activity that you can do in a classroom with children in response to the book? (e.g. drama, music, art, or writing) .


I read this story to a third grade class during math time. If i were doing a response activity after reading this book i would let students work with heresy bars to practice taking a whole number and divide it into fractional parts . Each child will get a heresy bar and count the rows and columns in their bar. next the student will determine how many pieces is the chocolate bar broken into. Students will remove one piece from the candy bar and write the fraction they see. each time they will remove two pieces from the bar and write down the fraction they see. At the end of the activity the students will get to eat the candy. This activity helps students to understand fractions better and you can also use this activity to teach adding and subtracting fractions.

[Abby · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fraction Fun is all about (you guessed it) fractions. It explains what fractions are, the parts of a fraction (numerator and denominator), and it give lots of examples of fractions in everyday life, like slices of pizza being a fraction of a whole. The book gives a lot of activities for kids to do to explore fractions, like dividing a paper plate into fractions, weighing different items to find out what fraction of an once they weigh, and it also teaches about money fractions (a quarter is one fourth of a dollar).
The uses of this book are pretty self-explanatory. You'd use it when teaching kids about fractions. It even gives step-by-step instructions and supply lists for its various activities. This is a very teacher-friendly book.
The illustrations have nothing worth mentioning.

[Janice Redding · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an awesome third grade book on fractions. It explains that a fraction is a part of something. This book elaborates on things that can be cut into different parts such a pizza, granola bars, etc. Then, it talks about the difference between numerator and denominator. I like how this book uses that we can use fraction bars. In the classroom, I can use this book to conduct an activity like using a paper plate and see how many equal pieces can be cut out of it in small groups. For example, one group can have 1/12, or 1/8, or ¼, etc. I can extend the lesson to ask the students which is greater or less.

[Laura Carby · Rating 4 out of 5]

This simple, hands-on concept book is clear and concise. The simple definition of a fraction, that it is a part of something, introduces a pizza pie that is divided, studied, compared, and, of course, eaten. Weighing coins determines how many make one ounce, and what the fractional value of each coin is. The cartoon like illustrations are colorful, whimsical, and humorous; they also make the concepts clear. Without a fraction of a doubt, parents and teachers will find limitless possibilities in this book. This book is one that my students LOVE!

[Dolly · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a fun book about fractions. Whether you do the exercises or not (we didn't), the concepts are made very clear and kids can learn to understand how fractions work. It's a good introduction, but I think if children have been exposed to the concepts before reading this book, it serves just as well as a reinforcement of the principles they've already learned. It has colorful illustrations that really help to explain the theories. We enjoyed reading this book together.

[Brittany Balunas · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book to talk about fractions with students. I love that it introduces vocabulary such as numerator and denominator, so I would use this as an introduction to fractions. After reading the book I would have students divide themselves into equal groups and then find other objects either in the classroom or items that they can think of that can be divided among members of their family, number of kids on their sports team, or even number of friends.

[Lauren Owens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fraction Fun is a crazy looking book about fractions being used in a variety of ways. The first part of the book is just an intro about fractions, but the rest are filled with lessons that can be done in the class to help students understand fractions in more settings than just a pizza.
Recommended grade level: 1-5

[Kasmarine · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a easy, simple, and hands-on math concept book. It introduces fraction and its proper names. It helps children to look, compare, and recognize different factions. It incorporates currency and coins to teach about fraction. I read it as a way to introduce faction to my children and we used the examples in the text as our activities ...fun!!!

[Nicole Holden · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a great book for introducing fractions to students. I like that this book has hands on activities for the student so they can have a better understanding of fractions. Using a pizza is the best example for explaing fractions and the student can definitely relate to pizza since this is most students favorite food.

[Victoria Clay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this was a great book on fractions. It broke fractions down part by part so that it was easy to understand. This would be a great book to read aloud as class because it includes great hands on activities that everyone could do together. I also thought it was clever that it used fractions to explain money as well.

[Vanessa Grubbs · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book elaborates on things that can be cut into different parts such a pizza, granola bars, etc. Then, it talks about the difference between numerator and denominator. I like how this book uses that we can use fraction bars. In the classroom, I can use this book to conduct an activity like using a paper plate and see how many equal pieces can be cut out of it in small groups

[Tiffany · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simple book about math. Explaining just what a fraction is, part of something. This book could make for a good lesson, even more for an extended lesson like; exploring how you can divide something up if the number of people you're sharing with increases. Ex; 12 cookies and 12 friends, now 12 cookies and 14 friends, and so on.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book to show parts of fractions, illustrate fractions, and equivalent fractions. Activities are interactive with the book. Combines fractions and weight/mass. Definitely want to use this book and activities with my students.

6th Grade Common Core Standards:
Ratios and Proportions
6.RP.2
6.RP.3.a

*Available at Albuquerque/Bernalillo County Libraries*