1. Decomposing Arrays Word Problems
By Naomi Church

2. Eliana’s Princesses
Eliana loves to play with her Disney Princess dolls. She organizes them neatly onto 3 shelves in her room. She decides to put 4 princesses on each shelf.
Build an array that matches this scenario.
Array should be 3 rows of 4.
Sample Decompositions: Break apart the 4 into 3 rows of 2 and 3 rows of 2.

3. Gavin’s Animals
In Gavin’s room animals are everywhere! His mommy wants to clean up his room so she doesn’t step on all of the animals! Mommy arranges the animals on Gavin’s shelves so that there are five animals on each of the six shelves.
Build an array that matches this scenario.
Array should be 6 rows of 5. Error Alert! Because of the wording, students may make the reverse array. Also note that now number words are used, instead of numerals.
Sample decomposition includes: breaking up the six rows into 3 rows of 5 and 3 rows of 5.

4. FSU Marching Chiefs
At halftime, the Marching Chiefs were lined up on the field in six rows. Each row consisted of eight band members.
Build an array that matches this scenario.
This scenario will take the longest due to the large amount of tiles in use. Be sure you have 48 tiles for each student to use.
Array should be six rows of 8.
Sample decomposition includes either breaking up the six or the eight in half. Or students may break it up into a group of 5 if they are good at multiplying by 5.