Teaching Greater Than (>) and Less Than (<)
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Greater than and less than icons are used to show the relationship between two numbers. They show us which has a higher value and are used to help children get to grips with numbers and their values. In this article, we will discuss how to teach this skill to students.
Why do we use greater than and less than symbols?
Greater than and less than symbols show the relationship between two numbers. They show us which has a higher value and are used to help children get to grips with numbers and their values.
Greater than (>) and less than (<) symbols, or more than sign and less than sign, are used to show the relative size of a set of numbers. The wide end of the symbol always faces the larger number, e.g., 25 > 10.
These symbols are a key part of KS1 math teaching, as using them will help children become confident in knowing which numbers are higher or lower than others.
These symbols are also known as the more than sign and less than sign or symbols. The more than sign (>) denotes that the number after the more than sign is smaller than before, the more than sign.
The less than sign denotes that the number after the sign is bigger than the number before the sign. The equals to sign (=) denotes that the number after the sign equals the number before the sign. The more than sign and the less than sign are inverted versions of the same symbol.
These symbols will be used throughout primary and secondary teaching from Key Stage 1 onwards (late KS1).
Children will be introduced to greater than and less than symbols in Year 2 following their teaching on understanding tens and the different units numbers can be made up of.
The most common way of explaining how the greater than and less than symbols work is by comparing them to a crocodile’s mouth and that the crocodile wants to eat the larger number. This simple but colorful explanation appeals to children’s imagination and will help them use these symbols correctly.
More than sign and Less than sign in the National Curriculum
While the more than sign and less than signs do not pop up straight away in Key Stage 1, the first mention of the concept of more than and less is in Year 1 in the National Curriculum.
Below is a summarization of the mentions of the skills of greater than and less than as well as the mentions of the use of the symbols in the National Curriculum and non-statutory curriculum guidance. The skills of more than and Less than are technically introduced at a younger age in the EYFS stage, but there isn’t any focus on the usage of these symbols at such a young stage.
In Year 1 under the Number and Place Value topic, pupils should be taught to identify and represent numbers using objects andvisual representations with the number line, and use the language of equal to, more than, less than , most, and least.
In this year of study, the non-statutory guidance for the topic of Addition and Subtraction states that pupils should discuss and solve problems in common practical contexts, including using quantities.
Under the Measurement topic, children should be taught about capacity and volume.
In Year 2, children will be taught the symbols. The curriculum states that under the Number and Place Value topic, pupils will be taught to compare and order numbers 0 up to 100 and use <, > and = signs. Under the Measurement topic, pupils will be taught to compare & order lengths, mass, volume/capacity and record the results using >, < and =.
How can I get children comfortable with these symbols?
Like with a lot of math topics in KS1, practice makes perfect! It’s a skill that can be learned through repetition.
You might also want to use this Greater Than and Less Than Up to 20 PowerPoint to introduce this topic to your students, or to give them a refresher on how the symbols work. Working through this as a whole class activity will help boost children’s confidence as they’ll complete the activity collaboratively with their peers and with teacher guidance. The later slides include more complex questions which will test your student’s knowledge.
Where do greater than and less than symbols come from?
These symbols were first introduced in 1631 in the book ‘Artis Analyticae Praxis ad Aequationes Algebraicas Resolvendas,’ written by the British mathematician, Thomas Harriot. The symbols were developed to highlight ‘inequalities’ between numbers and were used in the complex algebraic formulae that Harriot used in his book.