Table of Contents
Table of Contents
- Patterns in Whole Numbers
- Line
- Square
- Rectangle
- Triangle
- What’s Next?
In the previous segment, we learnt some tricks to add, subtract and multiply whole numbers. In this segment, we will look at another way to represent whole numbers.
How can whole numbers be represented as patterns?
We have represented whole numbers on a number. These numbers can be represented using elementary shapes like line, square, rectangle and triangle.
Let us understand how this can be done using dots. That is we will arrange dots to form the patterns of elementary shapes.
Dots to form a line
Dots can be arranged in a line to represent numbers.
For example, a single dot for 1, two dots for 2, three dots for 3 and so on.
Line to represent whole numbers
Dots to form a square
Dots arranged in a square can represent whole numbers.
The minimum number of dots that can represent a side of s square is 2. This means the smallest number represented as a square will be, 2 x 2, which is 4.
Dots to form a rectangle
A rectangle has unequal adjacent sides.
Thus, the smallest rectangle can be represented using 2 x 3 = 6 dots. This represents number 6.
Similarly, 2 x 5 = 10 represents the number 10 and so on.
2 x 3 = 6
2 x 4 = 8
2 x 5 =
3 x 4 =
Whole numbers as a rectangle
Dots to form a triangle
To use dots to form a triangle to represent a whole number, three rules have to be followed:
- The top row always has one dot.
- Moving from top to bottom, the number of dots in consecutive rows increases by one.
- Two sides of the triangle are equal.
Based on the rules the smallest number that can be represented as a triangle is 3. Similarly, the numbers that can be represented as triangles are 6, 10, 15 and so on
