Question Video: Finding All Ways to Subtract from 6 | Nagwa Question Video: Finding All Ways to Subtract from 6 | Nagwa

Question Video: Finding All Ways to Subtract from 6 Mathematics

Ethan is subtracting from 6. Write the missing sentence.

02:20

Video Transcript

Ethan is subtracting from six. Write the missing sentence. Six take away one is five. Six take away two is four. What? Six take away four is two. And six take away five is one.

In this question, we’re told that Ethan is subtracting from six. And if we look carefully, we can see he’s trying to find all the possible ways to take away from six. He starts with a very small number, so he takes away one. Then he takes away one more, so he takes away two. In our third example, we can see that Ethan takes away one, two, three counters. Of course he does. This is one more than two. So he starts off with six and he takes away three. And he continues going through all the different subtractions, taking away four and finally five.

But we want to think particularly about this middle subtraction. Six take away three is what? You know, we could use a part whole–model to help us here. In each of these pictures and each of these number sentences, the whole amount is six. This is the amount that Ethan starts with. Now, when Ethan takes away one counter to begin with, he’s left with five. And we know this because one and five are two parts that go together to make six. He takes away two then. He’s left with four because two and four go together to make six.

So now he wants to take away three. All we have to do is think about what part goes with three to make six. And we know that three and another three make six. And so we can complete our number sentence. Six take away three is three. We’ve followed Ethan’s pattern to find the missing number sentence. And that was six take away three is three.

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