Fractions with different denominators, negative numbers, percentages, and multi-digit multiplication all arrive this year.
25 August 2026 · 6 min read
Year 5 is a genuinely demanding year — several ideas that were deliberately simplified in earlier years (fractions restricted to the same denominator, whole numbers only) get their restrictions lifted, and children start working with the full complexity those topics actually involve. Here's what's covered.
Children work with numbers up to 1,000,000, including negative numbers in context and Roman numerals up to 1,000. Rounding to a required degree of accuracy becomes routine, alongside interpreting negative numbers in practical contexts like temperature.
Formal written methods now handle increasingly large numbers, including multiplying up to a four-digit number by a one- or two-digit number. Children learn about factors, multiples, prime numbers, square numbers and cube numbers, and use these to solve problems involving multiplication and division, including scaling and rate problems.
This is the year the "same denominator only" restriction from Years 3 and 4 lifts: children now add and subtract fractions with different denominators, using equivalent fractions to find a common one first. They also work with improper fractions and mixed numbers, converting between the two, and multiply proper fractions by whole numbers.
Percentages are introduced formally this year, alongside a clearer connection between fractions, decimals and percentages as three ways of expressing the same relationship. Children read, write, order and compare numbers with up to three decimal places, and round decimals to the nearest whole number or one decimal place.
Children convert between different units of metric measurement, and calculate the area and perimeter of rectangles, alongside an introduction to volume. Angles are measured and drawn accurately in degrees, and children identify angle facts (angles on a straight line, angles around a point). Coordinates extend to all four quadrants. Statistics moves on to line graphs and solving problems using data presented in tables.
Adding fractions with different denominators is the single biggest hurdle of the year for most children — it requires finding a common denominator, converting both fractions, and only then adding, which is a genuinely multi-step process compared to the simpler same-denominator addition of Years 3 and 4. Mixing up when to find a common denominator (for adding and subtracting) versus when it isn't needed (for multiplying) is a very common source of errors at this stage.
Grasp Maths treats fraction addition with a common denominator and fraction addition with different denominators as genuinely separate skills, since the second depends on a step — finding equivalent fractions — that the first doesn't need at all.
Looking for printable practice too? See our Year 5 maths worksheets.
Try a free Grasp Maths practice session, matched to the Year 5 curriculum.