If you're seeing this message, it means we're having trouble loading external resources on our website.

If you're behind a web filter, please make sure that the domains *.kastatic.org and *.kasandbox.org are unblocked.

Main content

Dividing a decimal by a whole number on the number line

The video explores the concept of dividing decimals by whole numbers. It emphasizes understanding division as splitting a quantity into equal parts, and uses the number line as a visual tool to demonstrate this. Then connects this concept to real-world situations.

Want to join the conversation?

Video transcript

- [Instructor] In this video, we're going to try to figure out what 0.6 or 6/10 divided by two is. And I'll give you a little bit of a hint. We have 6/10 plotted on the number line right over here. And so one way to think about it is, if I wanted to go from zero to 6/10 in two jumps, how big would each of those jumps have to be? Pause this video and try to figure that out on your own before we work through it together. All right, so as I mentioned, one way to think about it is how can I go from zero to 6/10 in two jumps? Two equal jumps, I should say. Well, if we just eyeball it right over here, I could do one jump like that and then another jump like that. So I did one jump and then two jumps. And so one way to think about it is we've divided 6/10 into two jumps, and each of those jumps are how far? Well, each of those jumps are one, two, 3/10. So this is 3/10 or I could write it like this, 3/10. We have another one, two, 3/10. So this is going to be equal to 3/10. And we've thought about it in other ways. If you have six of something and you divide it by two, you're going to have two groups of three of that something. So if you have 6/10, and you wanna put it into two equal groups, well, each of those groups are going to be 3/10.