Teaching Your Students How to Round With Decimals?

Your students probably have a good understanding of how to round whole numbers by the time they enter 5th grade. To increase the difficulty a bit, they now may be expected to round to place values to the right of the decimal point. Let’s take a look at some quick tips and an example to share with your students!

Find the Decimal Place – When rounding a number, locate the decimal point and identify the place you want to round to. Consider underlining this place to help you.

Look at the Number to the Right – Check the number to the right of the place to which you are rounding. If you are rounding 3.46 to the nearest tenths place, look at the 5 to determine what you should do with the number in the tenths place (4).

Decide How to Round – If the digit to the right is 5 or greater, round up; if it’s 4 or less, round down.

Round the Number – Now, round your original number. In 3.46, since 6 is more than 5, you round up the tenths place digit to 3.5.

Round Decimals to the Nearest Tenth, Hundredth and Whole Number!

This self-checking interactive activity is a must-have for your 5th grade math classroom! Not only will it engage your students with different types of decimal rounding questions, but it also will give your students automatic feedback on whether they got a question correct or not.

Once opening the slide deck in presentation mode, students will be invited to answer a series of 24 questions. Different types of questions students will encounter include:

• Standard rounding questions
• Using a number line to round a decimal
• Rounding money
• Word problems

How to Get Your Interactive Rounding Game

Are you ready for your students to “reel” in the right answers? Head on over to the green download button to access the interactive Google Slides version of this resource. Please note that you will first be prompted to make a copy of the resources before accessing it. 

To complete this activity, make sure to use the game in presentation mode. The correct and incorrect answers are linked to the corresponding slides, and the questions will progress forward as students select each correct answer.

This resource was created by Brittany Kellogg, a teacher in Ohio and a Teach Starter Collaborator.

Additional Resources for Your Decimal Rounding Unit

If you are looking for additional rounding resources to add to your teaching toolkit, check out some of our suggested activities below!  

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