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Medical Lake, Washington

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Math Fun (and practice)

We took some time one afternoon last week to play some games. Well, that's what the kids thought! Our "games" were actually some fun activities to practice multi-digit multiplication. (Teachers can be sneaky that way!)
There was one activity that was particularly challenging but the kids worked their way through it. It was GREAT multiplication practice. I think it would be a fun game to play at home, too. The picture below is what it looks like when it is set up. I will include directions below the picture.
It's called "In The Gap"......
What you need:
  • One deck of playing cards
  • One calculator
  • Scratch paper and pencils (for every player)
  • One 2 minute timer

What you do:

  1. Remove the face cards from the deck. Shuffle the remaining cards.
  2. Deal 6 cards face up, in the center of the playing area. Set the timer for 2 minutes.
  3. Players use the numbers on the cards to create multiplication problems that have a product between 350 and 500. They may use estimation or work out problems to find the answers. Numbers can be combined to make 2 or 3-digit numbers. (For example, the problem 51 x 8 = 408 could be created with the cards 5, 1 and 8.)
  4. When time is up, players share the problems they created and use the calculator to see if their answers are correct. Correct problems earn one point each.
  5. Discard the six cards and deal six new cards in order to begin a new round.
  6. 25 pts are required to win.

Have fun!

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