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Course: 4th grade > Unit 6
Lesson 2: Prime and composite numbersPrime and composite numbers intro
Learn about prime and composite numbers and practice identifying them.
Let's review factors
Factors are whole numbers that can be divided evenly into another number.
All numbers have and as factors.
Categories of numbers
We can divide almost all numbers into two categories: prime numbers and composite numbers.
Prime numbers
Prime numbers are numbers with exactly factors.
A prime number's only factors are and the number .
Let's use pictures to visualize prime numbers.
Farmer Maxwell is making a chicken coop for his best egg laying hens. He has hens and is thinking about how he can arrange them. He wants to arrange the hens in equal sized groups.
The only possibility is to make row of hens.
Any other arrangements would not have the same number of hens in each row.
When there is only one possible way to divide a number into equal sized groups, that number is prime.
Composite numbers
Composite numbers have more than factors.
Let's use pictures to visualize composite numbers.
Farmer Maxwell is also inventing a new egg carton where he will store the eggs his hens lay. He wants each carton to hold eggs.
He could have row of eggs.
He could also have rows with eggs in each row.
Or he could have rows with eggs in each row.
Composite numbers have more than one way that they can be divided into equal groups.
The number
Practice with prime and composite numbers
Prime number and composite number challenge
Use the clues given to solve the problems below.
Want to join the conversation?
- Is 0 an even number or an odd(51 votes)
- Zero is an even number. In other words, its parity—the quality of an integer being even or odd—is even. ... Not only is 0 divisible by 2, it is divisible by every power of 2, which is relevant to the binary numeral system used by computers. In this sense, 0 is the "most even" number of all.(33 votes)
- Why is one not prime nor composite? What is it called?(18 votes)
- 1 is not composite because 1 does not have more than 2 factors, and all composite numbers have more than 2 factors.
1 is not prime because prime numbers are divisible by 1 and the number itself. 1 only contains itself and no other number. 1 belongs to its own unique category named "units."(29 votes)
- Is every even number a composite number because every even number has a factor of 2 except for 0 and 2.(10 votes)
- Yes, all even numbers except 2 and zero are composite numbers.
Zero is neither prime nor composite.(25 votes)
- Can all prime numbers be odd?(9 votes)
- 2 is the only even prime number because every other even number is divisible by 2. All other prime numbers are odd.(13 votes)
- Two is a prime number because prime numbers only have two factors,right?(7 votes)
- still have a question about 0,the video explains all numbers have 1 and itself as factors.so you could say 0 times 1 is 0.or 1 times 0.But. then you could say 1 to infinty numbers ccould be possible factors of 0. is it prime or composite or neither?(5 votes)
- 0 is neither prime nor composite.(5 votes)
- Why prime number is created(7 votes)
- why is math called math?(4 votes)
- The word mathematics comes from Ancient Greek máthēma (μάθημα), meaning "that which is learnt", "what one gets to know", hence also "study" and "science". The word came to have the narrower and more technical meaning of "mathematical study" even in Classical times.-wikapieda(6 votes)
- Is this important??(5 votes)
- yes this is important(5 votes)