Pre-Algebra Games and Fun
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Middleschool Math and Pre-Algebra
As a final step before Algebra, children are taught fractions, percents, decimals and ratios while perfecting their grasp of the four operations, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. This mastery of the four operations is what makes the higher levels of math turn into fun puzzles and intriguing patterns of numbers that can explain the universe.
This article will give you an overview of math taught in K-8 as preparation for High School Algebra with an emphasis on games and activities that will help children in 4-8 grades solidify their understanding of pre-algebra concepts while playing fun and challenging games. Come roll the dice and shuffle the cards. It's time for pre-algebra fun...
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This article will give you an overview of math taught in K-8 as preparation for High School Algebra with an emphasis on games and activities that will help children in 4-8 grades solidify their understanding of pre-algebra concepts while playing fun and challenging games. Come roll the dice and shuffle the cards. It's time for pre-algebra fun...
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Photo Credit: Triangle Math with Marbles by Rev Dan Catt
Used under creative commons.
Hands-on Pre-Algebra
John Bull, Games Fighting Arguing Snap Cards Playing Magazine, UK, 1949
Buy at AllPosters.com
Of course you could use textbooks. There are many out there and you will be assured of covering all of the subjects thoroughly. However, if you are brave and have confidence in yourself and you child, there are many more exciting ways to learn all the math skills to prepare for algebra lessons.We homeschooled our oldest until she started 7th grade. When she entered public school for the first time she was beginning Algebra II. The following are materials that we used and found most helpful for learning pre-Algebra.
Number Sense
What do those number really mean?
Number Sense is understanding what numbers mean. From beginning levels where the number 5 represents five fingers to fractions where 1/4 means that there is one out of four and on to understanding that 2-5=3 does not make sense. This is the beginning of number sense. It is also understanding that 56 is a smaller amount than 65 and that 1/2 is the same as .5. All of these concepts are needed in order to begin to study algebra and there are games that you can play with your child to learn each one of these concepts.
Play finger games with your child. Despite all that you have learned up until now, counting on fingers is a good thing. Ask your child to hold up two fingers. Now take away five of them. That is a difficult concept for 6 and 7 year olds but with repetition they certainly get it by the time they are ready for algebra. Most textbooks stop there but I have found that it makes more sense to continue on and point out that you can have five members of your family who plan to eat at your table. Hand your child 3 forks. Once they have placed those three forks they can be taught the terms that they now have negative 2 forks or that 2 more forks are needed.
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Games that teach Number Sense
Number Sense builds skills needed for learning Algebra
Each of the following games helps to teach number sense. Counting backward and forward, moving spaces, skipping ten, going back two on the board helps children undestand the relationship between numbers. A good sense of just what numbers mean is vital when beginning algebra.
Hundreds Board Variation
Playing with Numbers on a Numbers Sequence Board Game
Learn the Four Operations with this variation on the Hundreds Board. Tom DeRosa from the I Want to Teach Forever Blog tells us that The Sequence Numbers Game
allows students to practice addition and subtraction number facts in the context of an easy to learn game. The game goes like this: each player/team has a handful of these number facts cards. The game board, as you can see in the picture, has color-coded numbers that match the cards. Each turn, you can put one of your chips on the answer to one of the cards in your hand. The object is to get five chips in a row..This game would be a wonderful addition to any classroom or homeschool family's game closet.
Add, Subtract, Multiply and Divide
You must know the Four Operations before beginning Algebra!
Unless you can answer this question with yes, quickly and easily, your child should be playing more games. Only with a quick, fluent sense of numbers and how to add, subtract, multiply and dived will your child be ready for learning algebra. But this is where the fun begins. Learning the four operations is best learned through games. Play games over and over. Play games often.
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Add, Subtract, Multiply and Divide with the 24 Game
Use the four numbers around the card to add, subtract, multiply and divide to get to 24. The first one to get to 24 wins that card.
Playing this game is not only fun, but helps your children to master the four operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. It is a game that can be played by children and adults. You might be surprised at how much fun it is playing games like 24 and not even realize that you are preparing to learn Algebra.
Muggins
Solidify the Four Operations
One to four players roll the dice and place marble on numbers to represent the numbers rolled on the dice. Roll a two, three and four and you could put marbles on those digits or you could add the three numbers together and place a marble on 9. You could also multiply for the number 24. Try to fill the whole board.
Muggins & Knock-Out Wooden Math Games
Amazon Price: $47.06 (as of 06/03/2012)
Practice math facts with this fun board and marble game.
Balancing Fractions
Free online Fraction Balance
All kids need recess and that is the first place to start when teaching children about balancing fractions. By experimenting on a see saw or teeter totter children learn through their bodies in a kinesthetic way just what balance means.
Then, make your own balance. Let the children experiments with many different objects, recording their answers and forming a more intellectual concept of balancing quantities of objects.
Next, use a real balance scale for fractions such as the one above. That type of balance scale works towards a concrete understanding of fractions because of the bars but a more abstract understanding because they are no longer measuring everyday objects but rather distances along the balance beam.
Once the children have had a chance to use the real scale, this online activity helps them move to a more abstract understanding of fractions.
Move the fraction bars to the balance scale and check to see if they balance.
Be sure to insist that the children write their findings in their math journals as this will help them to refine their thinking on manipulating fractions.
Now they are ready to begin manipulating fractions on paper.
Photo Credit: Teeter Totter on Flickr, Creative Commons.
Photo Credit: Home Made Balance Scale on Flickr, Creative Commons.
Then, make your own balance. Let the children experiments with many different objects, recording their answers and forming a more intellectual concept of balancing quantities of objects.
Next, use a real balance scale for fractions such as the one above. That type of balance scale works towards a concrete understanding of fractions because of the bars but a more abstract understanding because they are no longer measuring everyday objects but rather distances along the balance beam.
Once the children have had a chance to use the real scale, this online activity helps them move to a more abstract understanding of fractions.
Move the fraction bars to the balance scale and check to see if they balance.
Be sure to insist that the children write their findings in their math journals as this will help them to refine their thinking on manipulating fractions.
Now they are ready to begin manipulating fractions on paper.
- Fraction Balance Scale
Who Can Do the Math? is an interactive problem solving activity for elementary students.
Fraction Balance Scale
Practice adding and subtracting fractions in a fun, hands-on way that will help children truly understand what all those numbers actually mean.
Games for Learning Fractions
Fraction Game
What's My Rule?
Using Problem Soving Strategies (Grades 6-12)
If one number goes into the tiger's head and another number comes out, what did the tiger have to do to the first number to get the second number.
The problems in this book get progressively harder. I have never found a child that didn't enjoy the challenge of trying to figure out this tiger's mind.
The Game of Sprouts
- Sprouts Game
- Sprouts is a pencil-and-paper game with interesting mathematical properties. It was invented by mathematicians John Horton Conway and Michael S. Paterson at Cambridge University in 1967.
A 2-spot game of Sprouts
The game is played by two players, starting with a few spots drawn on a sheet of paper. Players take turns, where each turn consists of drawing a line between two spots (or from a spot to itself) and adding a new spot somewhere along the line. The players are constrained by the following rules.
* The line may be straight or curved, but must not touch or cross itself or any other line.
* The new spot cannot be placed on top of one of the endpoints of the new line. Thus the new spot splits the line into two shorter lines.
* No spot may have more than three lines attached to it. For the purposes of this rule, a line from the spot to itself counts as two attached lines and new spots are counted as having two lines already attached to them.
The player who makes the last move wins.
-Wikipedia
Algebra in the Concrete
Mary Laycock found a way to show algebra in a fun and exciting, hands-on way that excites kids to play with first year algebra. My 10 year old homeschooler loved using the cuisenaire rods to work out the problems while discovering the relationships between the different parts of equations. She quickly learned to make up her own problems. I wish I knew of a good sequel.
The Mathematics of the Spirograph
Symmetry
- The Mathematics of the Spirograph (Any Excuse to Play)
- Symmetry
Each Spirograph pattern displays two kinds of symmetry:
- Rotation
- Mirror (Reflection) - Spirograph Math
- Can a child really learn math from doing spirographs? This page explains some of the math that an elementary school child might learn from doing spirograph patterns.
Spirograph Teaches the Mathematics of Circles
Mancala
Mancala can involve strategy and complex higher math, putting it on par with chess and similar strategy board games.
Triangular Numbers
- Triangular number - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- A triangular number is the number of dots in an equilateral triangle evenly filled with dots. For example, three dots can be arranged in a triangle; thus three is a triangle number.
10 is the second triangular number.
Board Games
Roman Board Games can help pre-algebra students work on strategies that develop an understanding of mathematical concepts. The more times you play the game the more patterns and strategies you see. Play with another person and suddenly you start to see new ways to play.
- Roman Glassmakers Board Games Page
Ludus Latrunculorum: and Merils, or Nine Men's Morris were games of chance.
Mathematical Puzzles and Hinged Dissections
- Mathematics Learning: Jigsaw Mathematical puzzles
- You can make your own online Jigsaw puzzle. Why not challenge the kids to make Jigsaw puzzles of mathematical concepts? It's hard to get kids to do the repetition needed to memorize but when given the opportunity to do it in a creative way that repetition becomes a fun game.
- Hinged Dissections: Swinging & Twisting
- A wide variety of twist-hinged dissections with mathematical proofs.
Books of Puzzles
Puzzles use Pre-Algebra and Algebra skills without kids knowing it.
Cross Sums were one of my first forays into using puzzle books to teach pre-algebra. You don't realize how much practice you are getting in the four operations until suddenly realize that the puzzles are getting easier and easier.
What's My Rule? gently leads students from pre-algebra into the logical formulas of algebra. This book is so much fun it's too bad there aren't more volumes.
What's My Rule? gently leads students from pre-algebra into the logical formulas of algebra. This book is so much fun it's too bad there aren't more volumes.
Plotting in all Four Quadrants
Plotting Coordinates on a Cartesian Plane
- Plotting Coordinates on a Cartesian Plane
- Plotting coordinates on a Cartesian plane, but not sure how? Learn here on a site designed for middle school teachers, parents and students. Choose fun activities to practice this importa
Sing the Quadratic Equation Song
Sing along and learn the Quadratic Equation in preparation for learning algebra. You will be surprised how much this will help you. I love the way that the formula is sung over and over. The tune is catchy and sticks in your head.
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Learning Logic
Photo Credit: Two boys Playing Rush Hour
Share photos on twitter with Twitpic.
ThinkFun Rush Hour
is one of our favorite strategy and logic games.
Donald Duck in Mathemagic Land
Introduce Children to Exciting concepts in Mathematics
This is a video that can be watched and enjoyed by children from pre-school through high school ages. Each age will gain more understanding of mathematical concepts in a fun and entertaining way. Visual images of mathematical concepts will help when preparing children for algebra.
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Mathchat with Josh Rappaport
"If you think algebra has to be boring, confusing and unrelated to anything in the real world, think again! Written in a humorous, conversational style, Algebra Survival Guide: a Conversational Guide for the Thoroughly Befuddled
gently nudges students toward success in pre-algebra and Algebra I.
With its engaging question/answer format and helpful practice problems, glossary and index, it is ideal for homeschoolers, tutors and students striving for classroom excellence. It features funky icons and lively cartoons, an Emergency Fact Sheet tear-out poster, and even an "Algebra Wilderness" board game guaranteed to help students steer clear of "Negatvieland"--and have fun." -Product Discription
Josh Rappaport author of Algebra Survival Guide: a Conversational Guide for the Thoroughly Befuddled, offers the greatest blog for kids who are beginning to learn Algebra. He poses a question of the week. The following week he explains how to solve the problem. Each question is unique, fun and thought provoking. Homeschooling teens love working with him. They chat together online to figure out the problem and compete to see who can come up with the solution first. Sometimes there is a prize offered for the first one to answer the question.
Josh also offers suggestions for teachers or parents who are teaching their children of ways to teach and explain concepts in algebra.This blog is free, fun and one not to be missed.
gently nudges students toward success in pre-algebra and Algebra I. With its engaging question/answer format and helpful practice problems, glossary and index, it is ideal for homeschoolers, tutors and students striving for classroom excellence. It features funky icons and lively cartoons, an Emergency Fact Sheet tear-out poster, and even an "Algebra Wilderness" board game guaranteed to help students steer clear of "Negatvieland"--and have fun." -Product Discription
PreAlgebra Blastoff!:
Algebra Survival Guide
Algebra Survival Guide Workbook
Josh Rappaport author of Algebra Survival Guide: a Conversational Guide for the Thoroughly Befuddled
, offers the greatest blog for kids who are beginning to learn Algebra. He poses a question of the week. The following week he explains how to solve the problem. Each question is unique, fun and thought provoking. Homeschooling teens love working with him. They chat together online to figure out the problem and compete to see who can come up with the solution first. Sometimes there is a prize offered for the first one to answer the question.Josh also offers suggestions for teachers or parents who are teaching their children of ways to teach and explain concepts in algebra.This blog is free, fun and one not to be missed.
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More Mathematical Lenses for teaching Pre-Algebra
How do you teach your children Pre-Algebra?
on SheToldMe.Join me on Xomba.
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KandH
Dec 20, 2011 @ 5:10 pm | delete
- Love this lens: maths and puzzles - these are a two of my favorite things!!
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EMangl
Oct 29, 2011 @ 12:25 pm | delete
- by making games for her, i think i showed you :-)
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Rankography
Jul 30, 2011 @ 5:00 pm | delete
- if you have not checked out KhanAcademy yet you should. It is the coolest most revolutionary site I have seen in eduction and 100% free.
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tandemonimom Jul 25, 2011 @ 9:56 pm | delete
- FABULOUS page, Evelyn! I think the only game I could possibly add to this list would be Muggins. I'll be coming back here to remember the ones I don't have yet!
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AngelDey
Jul 24, 2011 @ 9:52 pm | delete
- This is wonderful. Thank you.
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akumar46
May 20, 2011 @ 1:06 am | delete
- Great method of teaching Pre-Algebra to children.Nice lens.
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akumar46
May 19, 2011 @ 8:38 pm | delete
- Great algebra lessons for kids.Thanks for such useful lens.
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Janiece Feb 7, 2011 @ 9:46 pm | delete
- I love your lens on pre-algebra games and activities!!! Can I bless it about twenty times?! Thanks so much for creating this page of fun ways to do math!
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TeacherCaren
Dec 24, 2010 @ 1:45 pm | delete
- Balancing, not Balencing.
I find that using food, not games, is an even bigger motivator for people :D.
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SofiaMann
Dec 2, 2010 @ 7:56 am | delete
- You do the math so much fun. Congratulations.
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bygproductions
Nov 30, 2010 @ 6:39 pm | delete
- I loved spirograph as a child. I'd probably like it today too. Am posting this on my fb Homeschool Preschool Through High School page.
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Ecolicious Sep 17, 2010 @ 9:42 pm | delete
- great lens. wish someone had played math games with me when i needed help. when it's time for my daughter to learn pre-algebra games will be on my list for ways to help. thanks
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JaguarJulie Mar 1, 2010 @ 8:53 am | delete
- Ah, this sounds so "sexy" my dear ... "Plotting in all Four Quadrants ... Plotting Coordinates on a Cartesian Plane." Don't you think?
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Evelyn_Saenz
Mar 5, 2010 @ 10:01 am | delete
- You certainly put an exciting twist on the subject! I wonder what you are plotting?
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Pukeko
Dec 31, 2009 @ 6:52 am | delete
- Fantastic! Perfect for our upcoming term. I have made this Link of the month for Jan 2010 on Math Resources for homeschoolers and it is Blessed by this Squidoo Angel.
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Evelyn_Saenz
Jan 6, 2010 @ 10:09 pm | delete
- Thank you so much SquidAngel, for featuring this lens. ,
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TrishH
Nov 5, 2009 @ 7:32 pm | delete
- This is a great lens. My son is starting to learn some of this and school now and it is a great help for him.
Thanks. going to check out some of your other lenses now.
Trish
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JoyfulPamela
Oct 3, 2009 @ 3:42 am | delete
- Again, great hands-on ideas ~ I love it 5*!
Pamela
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Amitabh1702 Apr 8, 2009 @ 12:30 am | delete
- Thanks Evelyn for visiting my lens and lens rolling it. I am honoured.
Cheers!
Ialmost forgot - a 5* for this lens. For all the information in here.
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Jimmie
Mar 27, 2009 @ 11:22 pm | delete
- My daughter will be in 5th grade this fall, so this is helpful!
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About the Author of this Pre-Algebra Lens
Pre-Algebra in the Kingdom
Pre-algebra on Wizzley
Come write about your experiences learning and teaching pre-algebra on Wizzley, a fun and easy place to express your opinion:
by Evelyn_Saenz
My passion is teaching and finding ways to teach children in fun, hands-on, creative ways. The unit studies I make on Squidoo reflect my view that learning... more »
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