Fractions are a way of representing pieces of a whole. Imagine you have a pizza cut into eight equal slices. If you eat one slice, you've eaten a fraction of the pizza. If you eat three, you've eaten a different fraction.

They help us talk about amounts that aren't whole numbers, like half a cup of flour or a quarter of an hour. Each fraction has two key parts that tell us exactly how much we're dealing with.

Every fraction is made of two numbers, one on top of the other, separated by a line.

The top number is the numerator. It tells us how many parts of the whole we have. In the fraction above, the numerator is 1.

The bottom number is the denominator. It tells us how many equal parts the whole is divided into. Here, the denominator is 3. So, $1/3$ means we have one part out of a whole that is split into three equal parts.

Fractions come in a few different forms, depending on the relationship between the numerator and the denominator.

Proper fractions always represent a quantity less than one. For example, if a chocolate bar has 4 squares and you eat 3 of them, you've eaten $3/4$ of the bar.

Sometimes, the numerator is bigger than the denominator. This is called an improper fraction.

An improper fraction represents one whole or more than one whole. If a recipe calls for five quarter-cups of sugar, you have $5/4$ cups. You have more than one full cup.

Improper fractions can also be written as a mix of a whole number and a proper fraction. These are called mixed numbers.

The improper fraction $5/4$ represents one full bar (which is $4/4$) and one extra quarter ($1/4$). As a mixed number, we write this as $1\frac{1}{4}$. It's the same amount, just written in a different way.

Let's check your understanding of these new concepts.