Rabbit Proportions

To understand the difference between ratios and proportions, we used images of rabbits to help us visualise what they look like.


We imagined we had a mummy and daddy rabbit who had a litter of babies.
The children chose how many black and how many white were in the litter.

What is the ratio of black to white?

Why do we call that a ratio?

The two rabbits then have a another litter with the same proportion as the first litter.  What could the second litter look like?

Why is this called a proportion?

How is a proportion connected with a ratio?

What strategy could we use to find other possible proportions?

Amongst some strategies shared, one student showed us how we could use a table.  

To help us see how that strategy works, this time we had a brown and a white parent rabbits.

We imagined the colour ratio of their first litter.

Then used the table strategy to find possible proportions.

We then created a true proportion and a false proportion of the second litter. 

 Covering up our table we had created, we shared the two possible litters with another pair and they needed to find out which litter was in proportion and which was false. 

Most of us decided to create a table as strategy for finding that out and we reflected how we thought this was a really useful strategy. We also enjoyed trying to trick our classmates.