ABCs and 123s – A Family Math Night Activity
Not every game made the cut. That’s where this activity comes in. As we were deciding which games to use in our Building Number Sense Power Pack series, we had to make some hard choices: which games stayed and which games were put back in the folder for another time.
Since this particular activity was really just that – an activity – we decided it didn’t fit in with our games theme. So in the folder it went. Until recently. I was organizing my folders and re-discovered it. And because I absolutely love the 0-120 number chart, I decided to use it at my local Gellin’ with Geometry Family Math Night as an add-on station. I’m calling it ABC’s and 123’s because I used squares to create puzzles in the shapes of letters and students then filled in the squares with numbers according to the number chart. I’ve included the FREE PDF for you below.
Multiple Versions
Just like all the games in our Power Packs, this number chart activity has several versions. This made it easy for me to organize it into three levels just like we do in all our kits: Beginning (K-1), Intermediate (2-3) and Advanced (4-5).
I created table tents for each of the levels and printed the activity sheets in yellow (B), green (I), and blue (A).
The directions for Version 2 have students rolling one dot die and a 1-6 number cube then finding the sum of both numbers rolled. This number is written in the top middle square.
Students can then either use the 0-120 number chart to fill in the numbers that belong in the other squares or use the number chart to check their work .
Supporting Parents
Parents don’t always know how to help their child in math. So a Family Math Night event is a great opportunity to embed some of the tools and strategies students are using in the classroom.
The tool I included for Versions 1 – 3 of this activity was, as mentioned above, the 0-120 chart which I borrowed from our Math Medley kit. The fist photo to the right shows a student and her parent working at the Beginning Level.
In the context of doing the activity, parents get to see – and experience – how this tool is used to help build number sense.
The next photo shows a student completing the Advanced level – Version 4. Because this level uses multiplication, I included another tool – a multiplication table which I borrowed from our Power Packs.
This simple activity covers skills from number patterns to beginning multiplication. To get your FREE PDF to use or share with other teachers, click here.