Division

One pizza for four people, 12 sweets for 3 kids, a fare that everyone splits: whenever something is shared fairly, you're doing division. It often seems like the hardest of the basic operations, but with the right picture in your head it's surprisingly friendly.

Sharing or grouping

There are two pictures behind 12 ÷ 3. Sharing: 12 sweets are shared fairly among 3 kids, each kid gets 4. Grouping: 12 sweets are packed into bags of 3, which makes 4 bags. Both questions lead to the same calculation. Depending on the problem, one picture or the other will be more helpful. The parts of the calculation have names too: the number you divide by is the divisor, and the result is the quotient.

When a remainder is left

Not every number divides evenly. If you share 17 sweets among 5 kids, each kid gets 3, but 2 sweets are left over. We write: 17 ÷ 5 = 3 remainder 2. The remainder isn't a mistake, it's part of the answer. It's always smaller than the number you divide by, otherwise you could hand out another round.

Multiplication in reverse

Division and multiplication belong together: 24 ÷ 6 asks nothing other than 6 × ? = 24. If you know your times tables, you can already divide. And you get a free check: after working out 35 ÷ 5 = 7, test it with 7 × 5 = 35. For bigger numbers, think place by place: split 84 ÷ 4 into 80 ÷ 4 = 20 and 4 ÷ 4 = 1, together 21.