Addition Connect Four: Math Fact Practice

To help the students practice their addtion math facts, I created a game called Addition Connect Four. The students work in partners to roll two dice. They add the two dice together and cover up the corresponding number sentence. The first partner to cover four number sentences in a row wins. You can download the file at my TpT store.

Addition and Subtraction with Bar-Type Graphs

Ms. Willemin taught the students how to use information on a Bar-Type Graph to add and subtract. Using the Promethean Board to display various graphs, she asked them different questions to compare data by adding or subtracting.

Ocean Addition and Subtraction

To review addition and subtraction word problems, the students worked in groups to solve two problems using fish clipart. As they worked, we practiced strategies such as counting up or down, using pictures or manipulatives, or identifying related fact family number sentences.

Family Math Night

Our school recently had Family Math Night as a way to teach students and parents games they can play at home to reinforce basic math skills. At the first grade table, students played "Place Value War." In this game, each player takes two cards from the top of the stack. They then determine who can build the largest number with their two cards. For example, if I drew a 6 and a 4, I could make 64. Whoever built the largest number, keeps the cards. The player with the most cards at the end wins. You could also play this by adding the two numbers and whoever has the greatest sum wins.

Large Scale Math Mats

Fellow teachers, if you are looking for a way to incorporate movement and engagement into your math lessons, try creating math mats on the floor with painters tap. Here are some examples of some large scale math mats we use in our class. One is a part-part-whole mat and the other is a ten frame. They are large enough that the students can step in them or we sometimes use manipulatives.

Making Ten Strategy

As we continue to learn our math facts, one strategy that we continually work on is "making ten." The students practice adding and subtracting from ten so that when they encounter a larger math fact they can use their knowledge of "making ten" to quickly add the larger number. To help them get a strong hold of adding and subtracting ten, they worked over a few day period to build numbers to ten with their corresponding number sentences on Ten Frames. Fellow teachers, you can download these forms from my TpT store.

Making Ten: Valentine's Chocolate

To review the concept of adding to ten, the students colored a box of Valentine's chocolate as either dark chocolate or milk chocolate. They then added the two kinds of chocolate together and completed the corresponding word problem. They then compared their number sentences with their partners. Learning the factors of ten helps students when using mental math to add larger numbers. Fellow teachers, you can download this file from my TpT store to add to your files for next Valentine!

Don't Let the Cows Out

In math we play a game called "Don't Let the Cows Out" to practice math facts. The students sit in a circle, "the fence", while two "ranchers" go in the middle of the circle. They use two large dice, "the cows", throw in the middle. The first "rancher" to add the two dice together correctly stays in the circle while the other goes to sit down. If the "cows" go outside of the fence, they both are out. This little trick deters the kids from throwing the dice to far and keeps the game from getting out of control.

Making Ten Addition and Subtraction

 

Fellow teachers, I just added a Making Ten Addition and Subtraction packet to my TpT Store. The packet can be used to teach students to use a ten frame to make ten and find the corresponding fact family number sentences. There are three activities that can be used to take students from guided practice to independent practice or can be used for differentiated learning. This download also includes my Ways to Make Ten Posters which you can also purchase seperately.

 

Holly Wreath Fact Family

In math we have been reviewing and practicing fact families and word problems. To help the students, I created this integrated art and math lesson. In this lesson the students made a Christmas wreath out of Holly leaves and berries. They then counted how many leaves and berries they had in order to find the total number and the corresponding fact family number sentences. The templates for this lesson are available on my TPT store.

Domino Doubles Snack

To introduce the conept of doubles, the students created dominoes out of graham crackers, vanilla icing, and milk chocolate morsels. They first put one piece of chocolate on each side and verbally identified the addition number sentence. They continued by adding one morsel to each side of the domino until we reached the sum of 18. Then, of course, they enjoyed eating their snack!

Holly Wreath Fact Families

I realize it is not Thanksgiving yet, but it is not too early to start planning Christmas-themed lessons for our students. Are you looking for a fun way to have your students practice fact families? In this mini-lesson, your students will create a Holly wreath using leaf and berry clipart. They can make the wreath on a paper plate or free-form on construction paper. Once they make their wreath, they count the number of berries and the number of leaves and record it on the included recording sheet. The students then solve the total amount of berries and leaves along with their related fact family number sentences. You can download the template from my TPT store.

Fact Family Tree Map Download

Here is a fact families activity that I created to help my students identify related math facts. The students sort the fact family card on large construction paper to create a Tree Map. Sorting the cards into fact families helps the students understand that they must use the same three numbers in the addition and subtraction problems. In my class, the students worked in small groups to sort and create the Tree Map. A recording sheet is provided to use as an assessment of their individual understanding. You can download the file at my TPT store.

Ways to Make Ten Posters

A common strategy to help students with learning math facts is to teach them to make ten. These posters help the students visualize, on Ten Frames, how many are needed to add to various numbers in order to make ten. Once they know how many is needed to make ten, they can the add the remaining number to ten. For example, with the addition problem 8+5, the student visualizes that it takes 2 more to make 10 from the 8. They then visualize that 5-2= 3. So, 8+5 is the same as 10+3. You can download the posters from my TPT store.

Fact Family Flowers

My teammate, Ms. Branch, shared an engaging math lesson on fact families that went perfectly with our garden theme. Each student traced a flower outline with four petals. They then created a stem and leaf. I gave each student a triangle fact family card. They wrote the three numbers from their fact family on the leaf. On the petals, they wrote the four corresponding fact family sentences. We then added them to our garden display.

Garden Word Problems

Using our Promethean Board, the students wrote various addition and subtraction word problems and then took turns solving them by drawing pictures. After drawing pictures to help them solve the problems, the students then wrote the number sentence and answer with label. They then wrote the related fact family number sentences.

Fish Word Problems

We have been learning how to solve a variety of addition and subtraction problems. One of our lessons was to solve fish word problems. When solving word problems, one of our strategies is to draw pictures. First we read the word problems together as a class and the students decided which numbers they wanted to insert into the blanks in the word problems. Because the students could choose their own numbers, each problem was unique. The students then drew the pictures to match the numbers in their word problems. For addition, they were able to use the strategy of counting all of the pictures to identify the number sentence and answer with label. For the subtraction problem, they had to use the strategy of crossing out the pictures, or fish, that were subtracted and then count what was left to identify the number sentence nad answer with label. The students then worked in small groups to solve one another's word problems.

Math and Science Family Night

Last Thursday we had a great turnout for our annual Math and Science Night. Congratulations to Carmen for being a winner in the Math and Science Night poster contest! In first grade, the students could make constellations in the science room or play addition and place value games in the math room. In science, the students placed a printout of a constellation on top of a piece of black paper. They then used a push pin to punch a hole where the stars were located. When they held up the black paper to a light, they could see the light through the holes and the constellation shape. In math, they could play "Go Fish to Ten." In this game, it is played like the traditional "Go Fish" game but instead of playing for a matching card, they ask for the card that would add up to ten with their card. Whoever had the most cards at the end won the game. In the other math game, each player would take two cards from the stack and make the biggest number possible. For example, if they drew a six and an eight, the greatest number they could build was eighty-six. Whichever partner had the greatest number overall got to keep the cards. Whoever had the most cards at the end won the game. These are games that can be easily played at home with a simple deck of cards.

Space Word Problems

In math we have been working on solving addition and subtraction word problems using a variety of strategies. One of the strategies we use is using manipulatives. Another is to draw pictures. For Guided Math time, four or five students at a time would come to my table to write their own word problems with a space theme. The students came up with the word problem scenerarios as a group and I helped them with the spelling. They then supplied their own numbers for the problems. The students then had to solve their word problems by drawing a picture and identifying the related fact family number sentences. After all students had a chance to write and solve their word problems, the students then used beans and space problem solving mats to solve each other's problems. This also provided the students a chance to come up to the ELMO to be the "teacher." By the time we were done with this lesson, the students had the opportunity to solve eighteen different word problems. Because the problems were written by their friends and were related to our thematic unit, they were highly engaged.