place value
Reading Passage 1
Baking by the Numbers
Jayla and her cousin Marcus were baking cupcakes. They needed to double their recipe. Jayla read the recipe card, and Marcus looked at it too.
“It says three and four hundred seventy-two thousandths cups of flour. That’s 3.472,” said Jayla.
Marcus said, “The 3 is the whole number. After the decimal, we have the tenths, hundredths, and thousandths.”
Jayla pointed to the digits. “The 4 is in the tenths place. The 7 is in the hundredths place. The 2 is in the thousandths place.”
Marcus asked, “If we round this, what would it be?”
Jayla said, “Probably 3 and a half cups. Place value helps us round numbers.”
Marcus smiled. “It’s just like school. The words hundred and thousand are not the same as hundredths and thousandths.”
Reading Passage 2
Baking by the Numbers
Jayla and her cousin Marcus were baking cupcakes for their grandmother’s birthday. They needed to double their recipe, which meant checking all the measurements twice. As Jayla read the recipe card, Marcus looked over her shoulder.
“Three and four hundred seventy-two thousandths cups of flour,” Jayla read. “That’s written as 3.472.”
Marcus nodded. “So the 3 is the whole number part, and everything after the decimal shows the tenths, hundredths, and thousandths.”
Jayla pointed to each digit. “The 4 is in the tenths place. That’s like almost half a cup. The 7 is in the hundredths place—smaller than a tenth. And the 2 is in the thousandths place. That’s super tiny.”
Then Marcus said, “Wait, if we round this, what would it be? Like if we only had whole measuring cups?”
Jayla thought for a second. “We’d round it to 3 and a half cups. That’s because the 4 in the tenths place shows it’s almost at the halfway point. Place value helps us decide where to round.”
After mixing the ingredients, Marcus smiled. “It’s kind of like math class. The hundred and thousand in whole numbers mean something really different than hundredths and thousandths after the decimal.”
Reading Passage 3
Baking by the Numbers
Jayla and her cousin Marcus were in the kitchen, doubling a cupcake recipe for their grandmother’s birthday. As Jayla read the ingredients, Marcus leaned in to help with the measurements.
“Three and four hundred seventy-two thousandths cups of flour,” Jayla read aloud. “That’s 3.472.”
Marcus nodded thoughtfully. “So the 3 is the whole number, and everything after the decimal shows the tenths, hundredths, and thousandths.”
Jayla tapped each digit. “The 4 is in the tenths place. It’s close to half. The 7 is in the hundredths place, and the 2 is in the thousandths—a very tiny part.”
Marcus asked, “If we only had whole measuring cups, what would we round it to?”
Jayla thought for a moment. “Probably 3 and a half cups. That 4 in the tenths place tells us it’s nearly halfway. We can use place value to round.”
Marcus grinned. “It’s like math in real life. Even though hundred and hundredths look alike, they mean totally different things—same with thousand and thousandths.”