Memorizing Basic Facts
The Distributive Property
Students should memorize basic
The distributive property helps students break multiplication problems into smaller
multiplication facts. They should
pieces. Once basic multiplication facts are memorized this will help students solve
practice by saying aloud he facts within
lager problems mentally.
a set in order before mixing them up.
Practicing skip counting numbers up to
10 both up and down will help develop
this fluency.
Using unit form will help
students determine the product of an
unknown multiplication fact.
9 x 8 or 9 eights can solved by thinking:
10 eights - 1 eight= 9 eights
80 - 8 = 72
or
5 eights + 4 eights = 9 eights
40
+ 32 = 72
The Associative Property
When multiplying 3 or more numbers the product is
the same regardless of how you group them. Students
can use the associative property together with the
distributive property to break down a difficult
multiplication problem. Moving the parenthesis and
multiplying the (2 x 2) first avoids multiplying by 16.