Elementary teachers, have you explored Mathigon.org?
Mathigon is a free favorite in my elementary classes. While many of the features are aimed at older students, there are an unlimited number of ways to use it in lower and upper elementary classrooms.
#1 Polypad
Polypad is just about everything you could ever want. The crowd sourced lessons and activities are available for immediate use. You can share activities you have made and students can turn in their work in the app. I have used it for finding parts of 10, modeling base ten blocks,, building an lableing 2D and 3D shapes, using geared clocks, building and comparing fractions, finding remainders, balancing equations… well, there is too much to tell, so check out the polypad tutorial page.
Multiplication by heart uses visual “flash cards” to help students develop multiplication strategies before leaping to fact memorization. There is no time limit, multiple chances, immediate correct answers and the ability to work on their own, or login as part of a class to track progress through level. Students were begging to have time to “play”.
I discovered this favorite when the math fact program when students were getting frustrated with the timed math fact program teachers in my school were using.
#3 Factris
More challenging, but still visually based Factris is based on Tetris, but the falling pieces can be adjusted into different arrays to fit and fill rows. Students begin to internalize which numbers can make which factors in order to get the result they desire. Students love it, and I have played for longer than I care to admit.
#4. Exploding dots
I may be cheating with this one, because while some of its upper level concepts are featured on Mathigon, the site that elementary teachers use is linked above. Exploding dots is a series of lessons and practice to develop understanding of place value from Global Math Week. It is an online version of “Zibs”, one of my favorite place value activities for elementary students (and beyond) from Kathy Richardson’s book series Developing Number Concepts (here is a great summary from Teaching With Jillian Starr). Even if you don’t use it with students, Exploding dots is a great way for adults to explore and build their understanding of how number base systems work.
Sarah Moffett
MCTM Region 5 Director