Fractions
In Year 4, fractions move on from naming simple parts to working with whole families of equivalent fractions, mixed numbers and improper fractions. Children learn to see how halves, quarters and eighths relate, to place a number like one and a half on a number line, and to add and subtract fractions that share the same bottom number. They also find fractions of amounts, such as three quarters of twenty, by splitting into equal parts and counting them.
Practise Fractions
Have a guess, even if you're not sure. Get one wrong and we'll show you why, so every miss is a chance to learn.
Timed practice
The same practice, just with a gentle clock. Pick a length and see how many you can answer.
Good to know
The fraction wall
Every bar is the same whole, split into more and more equal pieces. Line them up and equal fractions sit one above another.
For grown-ups
The big idea this year is that the same amount can be written in many ways: a half, two quarters and four eighths all name the same place on a bar, and you make an equal fraction by multiplying the top and bottom by the same number. Once a child can move between mixed numbers and improper fractions and add or subtract within one denominator, they have the groundwork for the harder fraction work in Years 5 and 6, where denominators differ and fractions, decimals and percentages start to meet. This is the reasoning that sits under a great deal of later maths, so steady, picture-led practice here pays off well beyond fractions.
What is in this topic
- Spot and complete families of equivalent fractions, such as a half, two quarters and four eighths
- Place mixed numbers like one and a quarter on a number line
- Swap between mixed numbers and improper fractions
- Add and subtract fractions with the same bottom number, including mixed numbers
- Find fractions of amounts, including bigger numbers and fractions like three quarters
How to help at home
Fractions click when a child can see them, so keep the fraction wall in view and tie every question back to it. Short, frequent sessions where they point at the bars beat one long sit-down, because the wall does the explaining and your job is just to keep them talking through it.
- Read equal fractions straight off the wall, then prove them with the trick: a half lines up with 2/4, 3/6, 4/8 and 5/10, so show that 1/2 becomes 2/4 by timesing top and bottom by 2, and 3/6 by timesing both by 3.
- Turn mixed numbers into improper ones by counting the parts. For 1 and 1/4, the whole is 4 quarters, plus 1 more makes 5 quarters, so 1 and 1/4 is 5/4. Going back, 5/4 is four quarters (one whole) and 1 quarter left over.
- Add and subtract same-bottom fractions by only touching the top numbers: 3/8 + 4/8 = 7/8 because three eighths and four eighths make seven eighths, while the eighths stay eighths.
- Find a fraction of an amount in two steps, divide then times. For 3/4 of 20, split 20 into 4 equal parts to get 5 (that is 1/4), then take 3 of them: 5, 10, 15, so 3/4 of 20 is 15.
Where children get stuck
The most common slip is adding the bottom numbers as well as the top, writing 3/8 + 4/8 as 7/16. The fix is to say out loud what the bottom number means: eighths plus eighths are still eighths, so only the top changes. Counting along the eighths row of the wall, three pieces then four more pieces, lands on seven pieces, never sixteen.
The other wobble is muddling the two steps when finding a fraction of an amount, usually timesing first or forgetting to times at all. Anchor it as 'divide by the bottom, times by the top': for 1/4 of 20 you divide 20 by 4 to get 5 and stop, but for 3/4 you carry on and take three of those fives to reach 15.