7th grade · Math · Unit 1 of 15
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.
Minnesota K-12 Academic Standards benchmark: 7.3.5.4; 7.3.5.6 · adding and subtracting positive and negative numbers
How we explain it
Children can open this short lesson before they practice.
- On a number line, adding moves right and subtracting moves left.
- A positive and a negative of the same size cancel out: +1 and −1 make 0.
- 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 Minnesota
In the Minnesota K-12 Academic Standards, this is unit 1 of 15 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.
Sample questions
A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.
Question 1
At 6 a.m. the temperature was -12°C. By noon it had risen 4°C. What was the temperature at noon?
🌡️-12°Canswer box°C
-8 °C
Hint: Rising means adding: -12 + 4 = -8. On a thermometer, count up 4 degrees from -12.
Question 2
Put these integers in order from least to greatest.
- 11
- 10
- -17
- -7
- -8
-17 → -8 → -7 → 10 → 11
Hint: Picture a number line: the farther left, the less. Every negative is less than zero, and a negative farther from zero is less, so -17 < -8. The least here is -17.
Question 3
Start at -6 and add 10. Where do you land?
- -16
- -4
- 4
- 5
4
Hint: Adding a positive number moves right. From -6, jump 10 to the right to land on 4.
Question 4
A hiker is 50 m above sea level. A scuba diver is 7 m below sea level. How far apart are they, measured straight up and down?
answer boxm
57 m
Hint: Write them as integers: 50 and -7. The difference is 50 − (-7) = 50 + 7 = 57 m.
Question 5
Which expression has the same value as 3 − 11?
- 3 + (-11)
- -3 + 11
- 3 + 11
- 11 − 3
3 + (-11)
Hint: Subtracting a number is the same as adding its opposite. The opposite of 11 is -11, so 3 − 11 = 3 + (-11) = -8.
Question 6
What is 19 − (-4)?
19 − (-4) = ?
answer box
23
Hint: Subtracting is the same as adding the opposite: 19 − (-4) = 19 + 4 = 23.