Fraction Word Problems (Add and Subtract Only) Worksheets
It is no secret that word problems are not everyone’s favorite type of exercise in math. This is because you first need to determine what is being asked of you. This is not always straight forward and fluid. There are a number of ways that you speed up your recognition of what is being asked of you. When you throw fractions into these types of problems, they only compound the level of difficulty. It all begins with looking for keywords and phrases that give away the types of operations that are involved. A huge walk through in using this strategy can be found below. In this series of lessons and worksheets we help students learn to work through word problems that include fractions and addition, subtraction, or both operations.
Aligned Standard: Grade 5 Numbers and Fractions - 5.NF.2
- Driving Distances Step-by-step Lesson- How far did Drew drive over his two stops to the market and library?
- Guided Lesson - How much pudding did Andrew and John eat? Which twin is growing faster? Finish off with Kelly making brownies.
- Guided Lesson Explanation - I fit the numbers lines in here to help best explain it all for you.
- Practice Worksheet - A nice offering of word problems. We go old school, these don't offer nice pretty pictures.
- Matching Worksheet - Match the fractions (proper and improper) to the problems that would create them.
- Answer Keys - These are for all the unlocked materials above.
Homework Sheets
Make sure to teach students the underlined or circled key items in the word problems. Look for trigger words, i.e., total and all = addition.
- Homework 1 - Julia walked 1/4 from her house to the market, and then she walked 2/12 of a kilometer from the market to the temple. How many kilometers did she walked?
- Homework 2 - Curt got some candies. 2/15 of them are pink, 6/15 of them are yellow, 3/15 them are white and the rest are green. How many candies are green?
- Homework 3 - Maria drove her car 2/5 of a kilometer from the library to the market. Then she went to the church 1/5 of a kilometer. She then traveled back to her home 1/5 of a kilometer. How many total kilometers did she drive?
Practice Worksheets
I guess that I was a bit hunger when I was dreaming up these problems.
- Practice 1 - Holly went to the grocery store. She bought 2/7 of a kg of apples and 6/7 of a kg of oranges. How much more oranges than apples did she buy?
- Practice 2 - Dennis grew 4/6 of an inch on his 8th birthday, and his friend Brian grew 1/2 of an inch. How much more did Dennis grow than his friend Brian?
- Practice 3 - James drove his car 2/4 of a kilometer from airport to home. Then he drove 4/8 of a kilometer from the home to college. How many total kilometers did he drive?
Math Skill Quizzes
The way the problems are worded, the progressions of operations should come quickly.
- Quiz 1 - Abby and Caitlyn are participating in a cooking competition. Abby made her dessert in 3/5 of an hour and Caitlyn made her dessert in 2/5 of an hour. Who won the competition?
- Quiz 2 - Cady drove her car 2/3 of a kilometer from her office to coffee house. Then she drove 4/15 of a kilometer from the coffee house to the home. How many total kilometers did she drive?
- Quiz 3 - Jesse and Henry are participating in a painting competition. Jesse completed his painting in 1/9 of an hour and Henry completed in 5/9 in an hour. Who won the competition?
Tips on Solving Math Word Problems
Solving word problems can be a headache if you cannot understand what the question is saying because it's unlike a straightforward equation or expression. In an equation, you just have to go through with it. While in a word problem, you have to learn what the equation is before solving it. Therefore, firstly you have to get acquainted with the problem and picture yourself in the situation to get the best understanding of what the problem is. After that, you need to ask yourself the following questions.
Q1. What am I Looking For? - Initially, you need to figure out what the goal of the word problem is. This is a tricky step and leads back to what is mentioned before, i.e. putting yourself in the situation of the problem given. In this step, you will figure out the equation required to solve the problem.
Q2. What Do I Need to Do to Find the Answer? - After you learn what you are looking for, the next step is to think of ways of finding out the answer. Since you probably would learn the equation of the problem. If you know what you want to find and the pieces to solve the problem; then you are one step away from completely understanding the problem.
Q3. What am I Already Given With? - When you understand what you need to look for and how do you plan to solve the problem; then the last step is to understand what are the things already given to you. Here, you can get lost; because some word problems provide you with details that are unimportant. However, if you know what you are looking for, then you can easily ignore the unnecessary information.