5th Grade Math: What Happens

Fifth grade math aims to prepare students for the big leap to middle school. With fractions, decimals and triangles it's clear your child is no longer just counting apples. By knowing the basics of what your child will be taught, you'll be better prepared for some tricky questions, such as “How do I solve this problem?”

 Although curriculum varies for each state, students working at the standard level should be able to:

• Understand the basic mathematical language of logic
• Check their classmates' work
• Read, write, compare, and place in order whole numbers to the millions, and decimals to the thousands
• Create equivalent fractions
• Understand how prime numbers are only divisible by one and itself, while other numbers have multiple divisors
• Apply the order of operations with a math problem, including division, multiplication, addition, subtraction and parenthesis
• Describe the important features of a set of data (examples: range, mean, mode, median)
• Convert improper fractions to mixed numbers and mixed numbers to improper fractions
• Understand and name different types of triangles by looking at their angles and sides
• Represent an unknown quantity with a symbol (example, 3 + 5 + x = 10)

 Soon your budding mathematician will be able to show mom and dad how to solve a problem or two.