Chapter 13: Ratio, Proportion, and Percent

Chapter 13 begins with some examples of ratios in real life. I think that this is a great way to introduce ratios to children and show them how it is used in real life. I thought that using the sticker to dime example was a great way to show students in elementary school how to use ratios. Using money to show students is a great real life example that students can relate to. I think giving children multiple ways to express a ratio (i.e. fractions, percents) is important to reinforce. Using patterns is another concrete way to show students relationships between two or more things. I think the relationship between fractions and ratios is important to reinforce, but I know that we do not do that enough in our program. I don't think that we show kids that you can combine ratios by adding fractions.

I think that proportions is a difficult concept for students to understand. There are multiple steps involved in comparing two ratios and students need to have a strong understanding of ratios, problem solving, and comparing fractions. These are all difficult concepts for students to understand. Teaching multiple ways to solve problems as in Figure 13-7 might be confusing to children and knowing how the children learn the best is important in this case. It is extremely important to give students real life, concrete examples in the case of proportional reasoning.

Percent may be easier for students to understand. A teacher can use multiple real life examples for students to make a connection to, thus making it easier for them to understand the concept. A student can understand the basic concept of percent just by knowing that it is a ratio based on 100. I agree that students do need to have strong understanding of fractions and decimals in order to understand percents. Multiple discussions around solving percent problems is important because it helps students grasp the concept, especially when using real life examples.