Subtraction is the Opposite of Addition

Well, if you can add something to something, you can definitely take it away. Sometimes children have a harder time grasping subtraction at the younger ages, so your participation is important here.

Money is a great way to teach subtraction, because many children will recognize it easily (if your child is younger, you may want to use something he or she can easily recognize, like food…).

Let’s say I had $2. If I took one away (say I spent it), I would only have $1 left. That really simple if you give you child easy-to-understand examples.

You could also use cookies.

🍪🍪🍪 - 🍪🍪 = 🍪

If you started out with three cookies and ate two, you would have one left.

You can make sure your child understands that subtraction is just taking things away from what you already have, then you can move on to doing more problems. The track toward being proficient in subtraction is similar to addition, but children tend to learn addition first, and progress forward with that skill, with subtraction not far behind.

In subtraction:

Minuend - Subtrahend = Difference

12 - 2 = 10

(12 is the minuend, 2 is the subtrahend and 10 is the difference)

Yes, the answer in a subtraction problem is just the difference between the two numbers. Your child doesn't need to know that at first, but that is useful to know when you start working with higher numbers.

A track for learning subtraction might look like this:

Pre-school and Kindergarten

  • Recognition of numbers

  • Ability to write basic numbers (0 - 9)

  • Ability to count up to 10 or more in pre-school and up to 30 or more in kindergarten

  • Doing addition first

  • Being able to do subtraction problems where the minuend is not greater than 5 (depending upon the school and teacher).

1st Grade

  • Being able to subtract numbers where the minuend in not greater than 9 (or 10)

  • Taking addition further with higher numbers

2nd Grade

  • Being able to subtract in problems where the minuend is not greater than 40 (without borrowing).

  • Making sure children know their basic addition and subtraction facts, by heart.

3rd Grade

  • Being able to carryover with addition and borrow when doing subtraction in double-digit and three-digit numbers.

  • Children will progress in learning more about place value and will apply those learnings to addition and subtraction.

This is a very general overview, but you can see that children will be learning addition and subtraction as they learn more about shapes, begin to tell time, learn about place value (up to the hundreds place in third grade) and be introduced to multiplication and division (while still sharpening their addition and subtraction skills).

Danita Smith