Learn Fractions with Cuisenaire Rods

Introduction

What are Cuisenaire Rods?

Cuisenare Rods are a collection of rectangular rods, each of a different color and size. The smallest rod is one centimeter long and the longest rod is 10 centimeters long. Click to read more about Cuisenaire Rods and Manipulatives.

Here is an example of the rods and their colors: If you don't have any wooden or plastic rods, you're welcome to print this page and cut the rods out to use in the following exercise. If you would like to purchase cuisenaire rods go to Cuisenaire Rods.

white = 1 cm.

red = 2 cm.

light green = 3 cm.

purple = 4 cm.

yellow = 5 cm.

dark green = 6 cm.

black = 7 cm.

brown = 8 cm.

blue =9 cm.

orange = 10 cm.

*Note: These rods are not to scale.



Getting Acquainted with Cuisenaire Rods



Directions: Print this page. Color the rods according to their size.

For example:

If you stack 2 white cubes on top of each other they would equal 1 red rod. Therefore, the rod below is a 2 cm. rod so you would color that rod red.







What are Cuisenaire Rods?	Using Cuisenaire Rods to Name a Fraction	Identify the Numerator and Denominator	Least Common Denominator	Adding and Subtracting Fractions
Equivalent Fractions	Teacher Notes	Cuisenaire Kids Page	GirlTECH Lessons	More Math Lessons



Send comments to: silha@girltech.cs.rice.edu

This page was developed through GirlTECH '97, a teacher training and student technology council program sponsored by the Center for Research on Parallel Computation (CRPC), a National Science Foundation-funded Science and Technology Center.

Thanks to the RGK Foundation for its generous support.

© June 1997 Molly Silha