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Use this website with Beverley Paine's Getting Started with Home Schooling - Practical Considerations to help you develop your own educational curriculum to suit your family situation, beliefs and lifestyle. The checklists can help you identify your children's current educational skill level in each subject area, as well as find any 'gaps' in their learning, plan what they need to cover or keep track of what has been learned. As you can appreciate this website is continuously under development... It's our aim to add pages on a regular basis in all curriculum areas: check back frequently. Feedback and comments welcome. We hope you enjoy the articles and activities and find the links and recommended resources useful. Over the next year we will be working our way through each subject area and writing fresh, new content which will also be reproduced in a reasonably priced handy reference booklet from our Practical Homeschooling Series. |
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The Gobble Guts Pizza Fraction Game
© Beverley Paine 1997
an excerpt from Learning in the Absence of Education
A couple of years ago I got into the game making frenzy again, and had a brain wave for a great game to consolidate fractions, especially equivalent fractions. I hate teaching maths using text books, as it often confuses more people than it enlightens. Games that reflect real life can be great fun, and very challenging. This one was. Making it was just as challenging, and a real lesson in maths in itself. I'd thought you'd like a copy of the instructions, just for fun.
First of all we made a fractions cake from cardboard. Using a pair of compasses we drew equal size circles on stiff cardboard and cut them out. We then dissected them into all the fractions up to twelfths. This was tricky and took a few hours, with much learning and experimentation. Accuracy is important.
We labeled each fraction of each 'cake'. And then coloured all the pieces - the 'whole' was green, the halves orange, the thirds pink, the quarters blue, etc. I made a holder of cardboard, like a cylinder, with a base, to store all the pieces. We disregarded the sevenths and elevenths for the game, but used them for other fractions activities.
Making the board was easy. I used a piece of card board, the stiffer the better. I then drew twelve circles on it using a small bowl as a template, in a four by three grid. I connected these circles with two way horizontal and vertical arrows indicating that you can move in any direction from each circle. Each circle was labeled as below, and a small circle within illustrated the fraction shown.
Make 1/2 Eat 1/8 Make 1/12 Finish
Eat 1/4 Make 1/3 Eat 1/6 Eats 1/5
Start Make 1/10 Eat 1/3 Make 1/9
We made 'men' from beads glued together, but you can use anything.
Everyone begins on 'start' and someone goes first by throwing a die. Each player must move the number shown on the die. If the player lands on 'make 1/3' he or she must take the fraction 1/3 from the pizza 'bank'. The player may then throw a 1 next turn. He can move in any direction, but must be able to do what the circle he lands on says. For example he can 'eat 1/6' by exchanging his third for two sixths and then returning 1/6 to the 'bank'. Or alternatively he can 'eat 1/12' by exchanging his third for 4 twelfths and then returning 1/12 to the 'bank'. Another option would be to 'make 1/10' by collecting a tenth from the bank. Etc. This is where the game can get tricky.
The object is to make a complete, or more than one, complete pizza, and try and land on finish. This is much harder than it first appears and is a lot of fun. Cooperative play is almost essential for someone to win! If you want an easier game leave out fifths and tenths. This can be really tough and frustrating for someone who is too young, so I'd advise playing their character with them and really helping them out, otherwise you may just confuse fractions in their minds. The game really teaches equivalent fractions in a hands on concrete way.
on this website is of a general
nature only and is not intended as
personal or professional advice.
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Thank you for visiting!
Pioneering members of the home education movement in Australia,
Beverley and Robin Paine
are passionate advocates of true educational choice for families.
They began homeschooling in 1986 and three years later started the
South Australian Home Based Learners
network. Beverley continues to write for homeschooling newsletters
and magazines as well as hosting several websites dedicated to promoting
and supporting home education in Australia. Her aim is to demystify the
education process and make it accessible to all parents. Enjoy Beverley's
wealth of practical knowledge, homeschooling and unschooling tips and
ideas through articles and books and online at
www.homeschoolaustralia.com.
Since the late 1990s Robin and Beverley have been building their home education
publishing business - Always Learning Books - from home with the help of their son Thomas.
"Education is not a preparation for life. Education is life itself." John Dewey
Please note that the opinions and articles included in the suite of Homeschool Australia websites are not necessarily those of Beverley and Robin Paine, nor do we endorse or necessarily recommend products (other than our own) listed in contributed articles, pages, or advertisements.
Please visit the following websites for information on homeschooling in Australia:
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