Fraction Classroom · 2.2.0 · Student pages
What does the zero in 0.04 do?
Keep tenths and hundredths in their places. Use a place-value chart to distinguish 0.4, 0.04 and 0.004.
Anonymous group code: __________ Date: __________
Discuss the opening question
Work through the explanation
example. A learner writes four hundredths as 0.4. What has changed?
- Name one whole before comparing any models. A tenth is one of ten equal parts; a hundredth is one of one hundred equal parts of that same whole.
- Write 0.4 and 0.04 in a chart with the decimal point between ones and tenths. Read them as four tenths and four hundredths.
- Rename four tenths as forty hundredths. Compare forty hundredths with four hundredths: the first amount is ten times the second.
- Contrast 0.04 with 0.040. Adding an empty thousandths place at the end does not move the 4; removing the tenths placeholder does.
Worked example: 0.04 is four hundredths. Writing 0.4 makes the 4 worth four tenths, ten times as much.
Practise, then check independently
Use p1–p3 for practice. Try e1 without help. Show how your place-value units or model support the result.