Number Lines: Ratios and Rates [TEKS Tools Grade 6]

Aaron Daffern
3 days ago
2 min read

This post specifically looks at how number lines can be used to solve problems involving ratios, rates, and percents. Read more about TEKS Tools and their rationale here.

Number Lines

Number lines account for around 34% of each 6th grade STAAR test. Within this tool are many uses: understanding number and operations, equivalent forms, linear relationships, and ratios, rates, and percents.

The main function of a number line is to solve problems involving the four operations, understand linear relationships and proportionality, or as a tool to move between fractions, decimals, and percents. By visualizing these quantities on number lines, students can better make sense of the how the quantities are related.

Ratios and Rates

Proportional relationships can be represented in a variety of ways. Double and triple number lines are helpful for solving problems by scaling up and scaling down.

6.3E - multiply and divide positive rational numbers fluently

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2023-4: a unit rate was given, students had to solve for a larger quantity

6.4B - apply qualitative and quantitative reasoning to solve prediction and comparison of real-world problems involving ratios and rates

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2023-13: a ratio and total were given, students had to solve for a proportional quantity

2023-32: a ratio was given, students had to solve for proportional quantities

2024-33: a ratio was given, students had to solve for a proportional quantity

2025-6: a ratio and total were given, students had to solve for a proportional quantity

2025-25: a table of values was given, students had to solve for a proportional quantity

6.4C - give examples of ratios as multiplicative comparisons of two quantities describing the same attribute

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2024-27: a ratio was given, students had to solve for multiplicative comparisons

6.4D - give examples of rates as the comparison by division of two quantities having different attributes, including rates as quotients

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2025-3: two quantities were given, students had to solve for the unit rate

6.5A - represent mathematical and real-world problems involving ratios and rates using scale factors, tables, graphs, and proportions

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2024-14: a ratio was given, students had to model the correct proportion

2025-36: a ratio was given, students had to correctly represent it

Wholes, parts, and percents

Proportional thinking can be used to represent the percent of a quantity when given the part and a percent.

6.5B - solve real-world problems to find the whole given a part and the percent, to find the part given the whole and the percent, and to find the percent given the part and the whole, including the use of concrete and pictorial models

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2023-8: the whole and percent were given, students had to solve for the part