Your child has mastered their counting, addition, and subtraction skills, and you’re wondering what’s next. When do kids learn multiplication and division? Is your child ready for the next step in mathematics?
In this article, we’ll tell you what multiplication and division skills your child will need and when they’ll likely learn them. We’ll also give you tips on how to support your child’s learning.
Key Takeaways
- Children begin to learn the foundations for multiplication in second grade. They formally learn multiplication in third grade and these basic multiplication skills continue to build until fifth grade.
- Children start to learn division in third grade and continue to develop division skills until fifth grade.
- Most kids will be able to both multiply and divide by the time they’re in middle school.
- There are several ways to support your child’s mastery of multiplication and division. You can utilize visual aids when you teach, provide real-world examples, and play math games to build skills gradually. Be sure to repeat lessons often and remain patient.
Table of Contents
- When Do Kids Learn Multiplication?
- When Do Kids Learn Division?
- Multiplication Milestones
- Division Milestones
- Ways To Support Your Child’s Math Skills
When Do Kids Learn Multiplication?
Typically, children learn the concepts needed to multiply in second grade, such as skip counting by 2s, 5s, and 10s. Then in third grade, kids are formally introduced to multiplication and start learning times tables.
This means your child is about seven years old when they start to learn multiplication. By the time they’re nine or 10 years old, they’ll likely have reached all of the multiplication milestones detailed later in this article.
When Do Kids Learn Division?
Division is more complex because, unlike multiplication, it’s not commutative. This means that changing the order of the numbers in a division problem changes the answer. Additionally, it’s often taught in the context of multiplication.
Because of this, children are introduced to division a bit later. Kids start to learn division in third grade. Then they’ll grow their math skills by learning to divide larger numbers and work with remainders and fractions in fourth and fifth grade.
Multiplication Milestones
To learn multiplication, kids will first reach several milestones, each corresponding to a grade level. Keep in mind that these milestones should only be used as a benchmark. Don’t worry if your child is a little ahead or behind. All kids learn at their own pace, and that’s OK!
Second Grade
When kids start to learn the foundations for multiplication in second grade, they begin with the relationship between multiplication and addition.
That means, when solving a multiplication problem, your child will be taught to visualize repeated addition. For instance, they’ll learn that 4×4 is four rows of four, which is the same as 4+4+4+4.
Third Grade
By third grade, kids’ multiplication skills grow a lot! They’ll be introduced to multiplication tables as well as:
- Commutative property of mathematics (the numbers in a problem numbers can be moved without affecting the answer)
- Associative property of mathematics (when more than two numbers are added or multiplied, the result remains the same no matter how’re grouped)
- Distributive property of mathematics (multiplying the sum of two or more addends by a number will give the same result as multiplying each addend individually by the number and then adding the products together)
- Arrays and number lines
- Multiplication tables up to 10
- Multiplication of numbers up to 100
Fourth Grade
In fourth grade, most kids have a pretty good handle on multiplication. They’ll begin to compute up to four-digit times one-digit multiplication problems. They’ll also multiply two-digit times two-digit problems.
Fourth graders also start working on mastering multi-step word problems.
Fifth Grade
By fifth grade, multiplication problems become longer and more difficult. Kids will learn to solve multiplication problems with up to three digits. This more advanced multiplication lays the groundwork for fractions and long division problems.
Division Milestones
Third Grade
In third grade, kids are introduced to the concept of division and learn why it matters.
Your child will learn about equal sharing (dividing a set equally between a certain number of groups) and grouping (dividing a set by placing a certain number of items in each group), repeated subtraction, and fact families (4+8=12, 8+4=12, etc.).
Fourth Grade
In fourth grade, kids’ division skills will progress significantly. By the end of the year, they’ll be dividing four-digit numbers by one-digit numbers, including problems that have remainders, and they’ll start working on fractions.
Your child will also be expected to be able to estimate and use mental math strategies to come up with reasonable answers to problems. Mental math strategies include concepts such as rounding numbers to make calculations easier and breaking large problems into smaller parts.
Fifth Grade
By fifth grade, kids start completing more complex division problems. These include dividing three-digit numbers by one-digit numbers as well as two-digit numbers. Problems will often reflect real-world scenarios, requiring kids to interpret the results.
Fifth-grade division problems challenge critical thinking skills and prepare children for more complex lessons, such as decimals and fractions.
Ways to Support Your Child’s Math Skills
If you want to support your child’s math journey, there are lots of different things you can do at home. Let’s take a look!
Use Visual Aids
Using visual aids is a great way to support your child’s learning. You can use buttons or coins, manipulatives, or number lines to help your child better comprehend the mechanics of mathematics.
For example, let’s say you have 10 buttons and you want to divide that by 2. You could ask your child to place the buttons in two separate, equal groups to equal 10 total buttons.\
Provide Real-World Examples
There’s nothing better to help kids grasp math concepts than using real-world examples. If you wanted to give 10 pieces of candy to five of your friends, how many pieces would you have to buy? If there are four of us and eight slices of pizza, how many pieces do we each get?
Play Math Games
You can include math learning in everyday moments to make it more natural and connected to real-life events. Playing math games is a great way to do that!
For example, you might play multiplication Bingo. Create a Bingo card with different products, and then call out the multiplication problems and have your child place a button or coin on the correct product.
Digital games can also be beneficial practice. Build a solid foundation with HOMER by Begin. With HOMER, your child can practice all of the essential skills for school, from math to reading.
Our kid-powered learning app makes it easy for your child to gain the academic confidence they need to succeed.
Build Skills Gradually
Rome wasn’t built in a day, so the saying goes. And neither will be your kids’ math skills! Practice individual skills one at a time until your child feels confident. Once they’ve grasped a skill, you can move on to the next one.
For instance, you might start letting your child divide numbers small enough that you can represent them with buttons or coins, and then move on to larger numbers later.
Repeat Learnings Often
Practice makes progress. So, when learning a new skill, repetition is key. Even when you’ve moved on to the next math milestone, it’s a good idea to go back and refresh earlier skills.
Have Patience
Your child’s multiplication and division skills will last them a lifetime, so give them time to comprehend the new concepts.
By complementing their school learnings with fun and strategic practice at home, your child will learn these skills and have a good time doing it!
Reaching Math Milestones with Begin
Now you know when kids learn multiplication and division skills. Children learn multiplication between 2nd and 5th grade, and division between 3rd and 5th grade.
The HOMER app by Begin is a fun way to build your child’s foundational skills in key subjects like math and reading. Then they’ll be ready to tackle more complicated math skills like multiplication and division when the time comes.
With Begin, your child will gain the confidence they need to thrive!
Frequently Asked Questions
Can a five-year-old learn multiplication or division?
Yes. If your child demonstrates readiness, you can start to teach them the foundational skills for multiplication and division, such as one to one correspondence and skip counting. However, children typically aren’t ready to begin learning multiplication until they’re in third grade.
If your child isn’t quite ready at five years old, don’t worry. Each new math skill builds upon the last. It’s a marathon, not a sprint!
How can I tell if my child is ready for multiplication and division?
A child is ready to tackle multiplication and division once they’re proficient in addition and subtraction. They should also understand arrays (for example, 3 rows with 4 dots in each row represents 3×4=12) and be able to skip count by twos and fives.
What are some tools I can use to teach multiplication and division?
Visual aids and games are good tools to teach multiplication and division to your child. Visual aids can include manipulatives like cubes, buttons, coins, or anything else that can be physically grouped.
Digital games are also a great way to introduce and practice multiplication and division. Our HOMER app, for example, can help your child learn in a fun way!
