I met with a student who invented two dice games in less than an hour this week! I’ll share those soon as well.You can download a pdf of the flashcards below. Did you come up with a cool augmentation of the game? Let me know in the comments.Įven better is when kids start inventing their own games. I have three variations on Damult Dice, but I’ll save those for later. If you know a kid, try this game out on them, and let me know how it works! I need to know if it needs tweaking. Maybe I’m speaking with a bias of someone who learned his arithmetic from games and then went on to become a mathematician, but games like this are great. Seriously, get a kid hooked on this game, and it’s the equivalent of dozens or hundreds of times table practice sheets. In fact, it gives even more, because the choice of which dice to add and which to multiply reveals some interesting structure of numbers. I spent some time playing this with kids the other day and I saw that (1) it was genuinely fun, and (2) it gives you almost all the multiplication practice you could ask for. I could either do (3+4) times 6 for 42 points, OR (3+6) times 4 for 36 points, OR (4+6) times 3 for 30 points. For example, I roll a 3, a 4, and a 6 on my turn. On your turn, you get to choose two dice to add together, then you multiply the sum by the final die. The Rules: Each player takes turns rolling 3 dice. P.S.: Well, for example, you could see how many you could lick in an hour, then try to break that record.īart: Sounds like a pretty crappy game to me.Ĭan we concoct fundamentally more interesting games that still give multiplication practice? Well, here’s my latest, so you can tell me what you think. P.S.: Oh, licking envelopes can be fun! All you have to do is make a game of it. Principal Skinner: Here’s a whole box of unsealed envelopes for the PTA! If you’re just sticking some packaging around it, I don’t think you’ve solved the fundamental problem.
Also, the multiplication is totally arbitrary. They’re more time looking at a screen, to start. But google returned 820,000 hits on a search for “multiplication games online.”) I guess these games are ok, and some kids like them, but I honestly don’t care for them so much. Of course, there are literally bajillions of multiplication practice games available online. Well, here’s an idea: play a game that requires multiplication.
Memorizing your times tables is a rote activity, it requires a fair bit of repetition for most, and it may need to be made fun. Math doesn’t need to be made fun it already is fun. (Important note: times tables are not math. We adults, rightly, ask, “How can we make it fun?” Unfortunately, practicing times tables can be unmotivated and boring for kids. Every kid needs to learn their times tables at some point, and this means practice.
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