Place value - Rounding to 1,000,000 - Presentation

The presentation on rounding within a million provides a comprehensive lesson for students to grasp the concept of rounding numbers to various place values. The lesson begins by asking students to round city populations to the nearest 100,000, providing practical examples such as Leeds with a population of 720,492 rounded to 700,000 and Birmingham with 992,000 rounded to 1,000,000. This activity not only reinforces the rules of rounding but also contextualises the skill by using real-world figures. Students are encouraged to discuss and explore the number of digits in one million and the significance of each digit when rounding to different place values, such as the nearest 10, 100, 1,000, 10,000, or 100,000.

Further activities challenge students to apply their knowledge by rounding numbers to various place values. For example, 450,985 is rounded to 450,990 when considering the nearest 10, and to 500,000 for the nearest 100,000. The lesson also presents scenarios where strict adherence to rounding rules may not be practical, such as when determining the number of ticket batches needed for a festival with an attendance of 311,712 people. Here, the organisers must round up to ensure they have enough tickets, despite the standard rounding rule suggesting a lower figure. The lesson concludes with independent work, where students solve problems that may require them to evaluate when the rounding rules apply and when they might need to adapt their approach.