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7th grade · Math · Unit 1 of 17

Add & Subtract Integers

Positives, negatives and zero pairs

What your child practices

Adding and subtracting positive and negative numbers with number lines, temperatures and elevations, including the idea that subtracting a number is the same as adding its opposite.

Alaska content standards learning standard: 7.NS.1 · adding and subtracting rational numbers, including negative numbers

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. On a number line, adding moves right and subtracting moves left.
  2. A positive and a negative of the same size cancel out: +1 and −1 make 0.
  3. Subtracting a negative is the same as adding a positive.

Example: −3 + 5 = ? Start at −3 on the number line. Move 5 to the right: −2, −1, 0, 1, 2. Answer: 2

Add & Subtract Integers in Alaska

In the Alaska content standards, this is unit 1 of 17 in 7th grade Math, before Decimal Operations.

Gradelings describes a child's practice on this unit as Beginning, Approaching, Meeting or Exceeding (Four practice steps). That reflects practice, not a report-card mark: the teacher decides the mark.

Source: Alaska Department of Education and Early Development

Sample questions

A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.

  1. Question 1

    At 6 a.m. the temperature was -19°C. By noon it had risen 3°C. What was the temperature at noon?

    🌡️-19°C

    answer box°C

  2. Question 2

    A hiker is 40 m above sea level. A scuba diver is 8 m below sea level. How far apart are they, measured straight up and down?

    answer boxm

  3. Question 3

    What is 12 + (-8)?

    12 + (-8) = ?

    • -4
    • -20
    • 4
    • 20

  4. Question 4

    What is -14 − (-6)?

    -14 − (-6) = ?

    answer box

  5. Question 5

    Put these integers in order from least to greatest.

    • 3
    • 12
    • -11
    • 8
    • -14

  6. Question 6

    Amir is scuba diving at -20 m (below the surface). Amir swims up 19 m, then down 6 m. What integer gives Amir's new position?

    answer boxm

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