SamizdatMath

This is a rounding game I developed for a colleague at my school: I am a working teacher (as I have been for the past 37 years) so I know stuff. And here’s what I know: games are fun, learners like to play games, and games should exercise the learner’s mind in a variety of ways. Which is how I developed the “rounding” and “un-rounding” games. The “Rounding Game” is your basic bingo game: you turn over two cards, round off the number to the nearest ten, find that rounded number on the bingo board

This is a rounding game I developed for a colleague at my school: I am a working teacher (as I have been for the past 37 years) so I know stuff. And here’s what I know: games are fun, learners like to play games, and games should exercise the learner’s mind in a variety of ways. Which is how I developed the “rounding” and “un-rounding” games. The “Rounding Game” is your basic bingo game: you turn over two cards, round off the number to the nearest ten, find that rounded number on the bingo board

This is a rounding game I developed for a colleague at my school: I am a working teacher (as I have been for the past 37 years) so I know stuff. And here’s what I know: games are fun, learners like to play games, and games should exercise the learner’s mind in a variety of ways. Which is how I developed the “rounding” and “un-rounding” games. The “Rounding Game” is your basic bingo game: you turn over two cards, round off the number to the nearest ten, find that rounded number on the bingo board

Okay, phrens, you're teaching your students how to round numbers and this is what you are NOT going to do: "Students, today we're going to learn how round numbers to the nearest hundreds. To round a number to the hundreds, start by placing your finger on the number furthest to the left (places finger on number) and then look over to the right and then sing this song, "If it's less than 4 or smaller, round it down; if it's 5 or greater, then go right up!" (If you'll pardon the pun.) Then give yo

This is a set of lesson plans with an awesome set of 10 different "Mystery Number" activities. Seriously, do you want a FECKING GOOD way to transform what appears to be a really boring lesson ("Here's how you round off two digit numbers, kiddies!') into a lesson that includes reasoning, hypothesis testing, problem solving AND collaboration! Ten different booklets: a "Sample" to demonstrate to your students, plus 9 more for them to work on individually or collaboratively. AND there's a FECKING

These are highly unusual puzzles that are a great way to practice place value while stimulating your students' abilities in deductive reasoning. Each puzzle is set up as an "acrostic" that has to be filled in vertically and horizontally. The "beginner" puzzles are simple to solve, but they are valuable in that they help students to stop thinking of assembling place value by "order" (such as ".8 + .04 = .84," instead of alternating ".04 + .8 = .84") There are 20 different puzzles that use ones a

These are highly unusual puzzles that are a great way to practice place value while stimulating your students' abilities in deductive reasoning. Each puzzle is set up as an "acrostic" that has to be filled in vertically and horizontally. The "beginner" puzzles are simple to solve, but they are valuable in that they help students to stop thinking of assembling place value by "order" (such as "80 + 4 = 84," instead of alternating "4 + 80 = 84") There are 20 different puzzles that use ones and tens

It's wild, it's crazy, it's Jack Gabarino! Great for enhancing your students' problem solving skills.... Machina! Machina! Machina!

Greetings friend & fellow educator, Here we go again: just when you thought you had everything fixed up and all your ducks lined up in a neat little row, I’m back to give you some straight talk about place value, because, as I’m fond of saying, you’re teaching it wrong. Not only are you teaching it wrong, but you probably don’t even understand much of it yourself. Oh, you thought you knew everything, just because you bought a few games and did some random stuff with those silly “foldables” th

How much Cash is in that Stash? If you've ever struggled with finding a fun and effective way to teach the distributive property of multiplication over addition and subtraction, this is the activity for you. Using the example of a suitcase full of dollar bills, students will learn how to effectively count the cash in groups by dividing up the cash into smaller rectangular arrays, whose products can be combined to find a solution. This activity includes a sample problem, specific teaching instru

This packet includes a cover letter for parents that describes the importance of doing math over the summer break, and features a handy chart with a list of the 6 games that are part of this pack, along with a checklist for the dates when they are played. If the child follows the chart, he/she will have practiced math over 50 times during the summer. There are 6 games in the packet, which can be played as partners. They practice addition, subtraction, place value and estimation, and includes ga

Here's something for you to try out in this newest of years: a 4 clue number puzzle which utilizes multiples, consecutive numbers, yadda, yadda. Cut n' Serve! Updated for 2019 (because the solution is 2019.....) Another fine product brought to you by SamizdatMath!

By the Digits is a fully interactive activity to teach your students about place value, regrouping, addition and estimation. Simply tap the "round" number and a random number will appear in the "digit" column. Write that digit in the ones or tens place. Continue for 7 rounds, add up the ones and tens and see how close to 100 you got. This comes in a "demo" version, which is a single board, and a "competition version" where two teams can compete against one another (mad shoutout to Karol who sug

Tired of the old "make a flat" game? Do you want your kids to enjoy learning about and using place value? Close to a Flat challenges children to think about place value when planning strategy to win a game: in 5 rounds a student chooses between cubes and rods to get as close to making a flat as possible, or in 6 rounds, choosing cubes, rods and flats to make a thousand cube. This game includes puzzles for kids to take home, as well as mats to keep track of cubes, rods and flats. There is also a

Number Snakes is a game that develops strategies dealing with place value, numeration, seriation and proportionality. Students choose two cards to make a double digit number, name it, and then decide on which "band" of a snake it should go. However, as more bands of the snakes are filled in, the game becomes more difficult, as careful attention must be paid to how far apart each number should be. There are 7 different levels of the game, from filling in 3 spaces, to filling in 8 spaces, as wel