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Investigation: Scaling recipes

Overview
Activity
Reflection

Investigate how to scale a recipe.

Objectives
  • To apply a scale factor to a practical situation.
  • To apply operations with fractions to real life situations.
  • To convert measurements in one unit to another.
Materials
  • Internet
  • Paper
  • Pen or pencil
  • Cookbook (optional)

Scale a recipe

Find a recipe
Find a recipe from a cookbook or the internet where at least half of the ingredients are fractional quantities.
Scale the recipe for the class
Scale your recipe so that you have exactly enough servings for everyone in your class. Identify the new quantities of each ingredient that you’ll need and write them down.
Scale the recipe for your family
Then, scale your recipe so that you have exactly enough servings for everyone in your immediate family. Identify the new quantities of each ingredient you’ll need and write them down.
Investigate
Consider the following questions once you have completed the procedure above.
1.
What operation(s) are you using to scale the recipe?
2.
What process did you follow to scale the ingredients?
3.
When you scaled the recipe for the second time for your family members, did you scale the original recipe or the scaled version of the recipe from the first time you scaled the recipe? Why did you choose this method?

Answer the questions below after you have completed the activity.

Discussion
1.
What operations are used when we scale up a recipe or scale down a recipe?
2.
Come up with an example of scaling something in real life besides a recipe.

Outcomes

6.NS.A.1

Interpret and compute quotients of fractions, and solve word problems involving division of fractions by fractions, e.g. By using visual fraction models and equations to represent the problem.

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