Hands-On

Practice!

Goal: Use pictures to identify subtraction sentences.

Great job helping the engineers! It was so helpful to have pictures of the rockets and their windows--and to be able to see which windows needed to be taken away. Let’s try making our own spaceships using paper cups! You can even draw aliens on them! Now the aliens have spaceships to fly home for dinner.

There were 13 spaceships on their way home. 7 spaceships landed on a red planet, and the rest kept flying to reach the other planets in the galaxy. How many spaceships are still flying in space?

This is our subtraction sentence:

13 is the whole of the subtraction sentence because it is the number of spaceships flying before any landed and were “taken away.” 7 is the part that is being “taken away,” because it is the number of spaceships that landed and are no longer flying through space.

It would help us find the difference if we had some spaceships, or pictures of them, so that we can find how many spaceships are still on their way home. We will need to start with 13 paper-cup spaceships. Get 13 of yours ready to go!

Now we need to take away the 7 aliens that landed on the red planet. We will put red x’s on the 7 cups that you remove from the line of 13 cups at home. Click the first 7 cups to “take them away.”

We took away the 7 spaceships that landed on the red planet. Now we can see the number of spaceships that are still flying home!

You did such a great job using your spaceships to solve the subtraction problem! Use your spaceship cups to help you answer the following questions:

There are 13 spaceships flying in space. 8 of them land on a blue planet, and the rest keep flying to reach the other planets in the galaxy.

How many spaceship cups do you need to show the whole of the subtraction sentence?

Check

That’s right! The whole is 13, because there were 13 spaceships flying before any landed and were “taken away.”

That wasn’t the right number of cups. There were 13 spaceships flying in space before any landed, so you will need 13 cups.

Now we need to take away the number of spaceships that landed on the blue planet. How many cups will you take out of the line? Click the correct number of cups to take them away.

Answer

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8! 8 spaceships landed on a blue planet and were taken away.

There are 15 spaceships flying in space. 6 of them land on a blue planet, and the rest keep flying to reach the other planets in the galaxy.

How many spaceship cups do you need to show the whole of the subtraction sentence?

Check

That’s right! The whole is 15, because there were 15 spaceships flying before any landed and were “taken away.”

Sorry, that wasn’t the right number of cups. You will need 15 cups to show the 15 spaceships that were flying in space before any landed and were “taken away.”

Now we need to take away the number of spaceships that landed on the blue planet. How many cups will you take out of the line? Click the correct number of cups to take them away.

Answer

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6! 6 spaceships landed on a blue planet and were taken away.