"Go Fish" Doubles and Doubles+1

Last week we learned about Doubles+1. The students built Doubles towers and then added 1 to the second tower to practice the addition equations. For additional practice the students played a Doubles and Doubles+1 version of "Go Fish." You can download the game here to practice at home or in your own classroom. Just print the fish on the back of the number cards and you're ready.

Christmas Gifts that Teach

Several parents have asked if there are any specific items that you can buy to help your child with their reading and math. My best advice is to find games that teach. Below are a few games and toys that I highly recommend:

• Scrabble Flash - Students make as many words out of the letter combinations as possible. It is very similar to the Making Words activity that we do in class each Friday. Students will start to see patterns in words as they can change only one or two letters to make a new word. The great thing about this game is that it has automatic scoring and can be played independently.
• Bananagrams - The game is played like Scrabble but does not require the board and is easy to travel with. Through playing with words, students will begin to make more connections between the spelling of words.
• Bendomino - This is a twist on classic dominoes, which I also love. Dominoes help students with number recognition and can be used as manipulatives in a variety of ways. As you play dominoes with your child, have them add the two numbers of the domino before placing it down.

With those recommendations, I must say that I believe children do need time to just play and be kids. It is great to find teachable moments at home to reinforce what we are learning at school, but it is just as important to let children express themselves in stress-free, unstructured play. For that, I recommend having a supply of crayons, markers, blank paper, Legos and other types of blocks.

Don't Let the Cows Out!

In an effort to create an engaging way for the students to practice their math facts, I came up with a game called "Don't Let the Cows Out!" It's a game that you can play easily at home or even in the car with your children. The way to play the game is to get two dice - we use large foam dice - but you can use regular dice. Two players roll the dice, one per child. The dice are the "cows." The first student out of the two players to add the dice together and say the sum correctly wins and stays in the middle of the circle, or "fence." The students who are awaiting their turn act as the fence. While they are acting as the "fence" the students also pretend to cook for the "ranchers" in the middle. If a player has stayed in the middle of the "fence" for a while because they are winning, we take a break to pretend to throw some food as a way to encourage and cheer on the players. Students are reminded not to "let the cows out" of the fence as a way to keep the game in control. If a student rolls the dice out of the fence, they are automatically out and have to go "clean the cow stalls." Below are a few examples of the game in play. I encourage you to get some dice to keep in the car for long trips or for places where waits may be long (doctors' offices, etc.)

Place Value Towers

This week we are reviewing Place Value and working on identifying larger numbers. One way that we are doing this is by playing a game called Place Value Towers. In Place Value Towers we have two teams. A player from each team draws a number out of a bag. The players race to see who can build that number the fastest with Pop Cubes. The person who builds it the fastest with the correct answer wins a point. Then we take the Pop Cubes and put them together in a tower to see which one is the greatest. It is a good visual representation for the students that the number that is the greatest will have the tallest tower. The team with the greatest number will also earn a point. So, a team could earn two points in one round or they could both earn a point. The team with the most points at the end wins. We keep track of the points by using Tally Marks which reinforces skip counting by fives.