Kindergarten Math Games

Kindergarten Math Games

Addition Top-It

2-3 players

Directions: each player is dealt the same amount of cards, facing down. Once cards are dealt, each player takes two qcards and puts them in the middle of the circle, facing up. Up The player whose cards have the highest sum gets to keep all of the cards and they start a new pile. Once they go through their first card pile, they move onto the new pile. The player with all of the cards or the most cards wins!

Trash

2 players 

Directions: each player makes two rows of 5 cards, facing down, and they put the remaining cards in the middle. Each player takes turns taking a card from the middle pile, and placing that card in numerical order (so, if the card drawn was a 4, it would go in place of the 4th card in the top row, facing up) The player then looks at the card that was previously holding that spot, and they continue to play the cards until they are no longer able to make another move. If they pick up a card and they already have that number card, it goes int the discard pile. The goal of the game is to get all numbers 1-10 in numerical order as shown:

1   2 3   4 5 

6   7 8   9 10

The first player to get all 10 cards in order facing up wins!

Monster Squeeze

In this game, we put a number line on our white board with numbers 1-10 and had two sticky notes on either side of the number line. Each of the giraffes took turns thinking of a number in their brain as the other giraffes tried to guess that number. If the other giraffes guessed the wrong number, the person thinking of the number would give everyone else a clue by saying whether their number was greater than or less than the number in their brain. We would then move the sticky note over so we knew it could only be one of the numbers between the sticky notes. Once someone correctly guesses the number, it becomes their turn to think of a number!

Tenzi

In this game, each giraffe had the same number of dice (we've been playing with 5 dice each), and their goal was to roll their dice until they all showed the same number. After their first roll, the giraffes would look at their dice to see if any of them were showing the same number, and then they would leave those dice that were already showing the same number and pick up those that weren't. They would continue rolling their dice until all of them were showing the same number. Once all of someone's dice are showing the same number, that person shouts "TENZI!" and they win that round. 

*For example, if a giraffe rolled five dice and two of those dice showed the number 3, they would pick up their other three dice until they showed the number 3 as well. Every time one of the dice was a 3, they could leave that die and continue rolling the rest until they too showed the number 3. Once you play this game a few times, you can change the goal of the game to different things too--if everyone is rolling 6 dice, they could keep rolling until they get all numbers 1-6, or maybe they have to get 3 of one number and 3 of another, or EVERYONE has to roll the same number! 

Dominoes

While we've had a lot of fun building with dominoes, we've also had a lot of fun learning to play the game! To play, everyone divides the dominoes equally between all the players and one person puts down a domino. The person next to them has to find a domino that matches one of the sides of that domino. Everyone continues to take turns finding places to connect their dominoes, and the first person to get rid of all their dominoes wins! 

Gotcha!

For this game, you don't need any materials at all! All you need to do is take turns counting by 1s, saying 4 numbers at a time. If you count correctly with, your partner gives you a thumbs up, if you try to trick them and you don't count in order, they say "GOTCHA!" You can practice counting by 1s wherever your giraffe feels most comfortable--1-5, 1-10, 1-20--some giraffes were even counting 1-100! 

This is another game you can play without any materials at home. For this game, everyone playing stands in a circle and you choose a number to start and end at (for example, 1-5). Everyone goes around in the circle counting one by one until someone reaches the end number. Once someone says the end number, the next person says "Sparkle!" and the person next to them sits down. If someone says the wrong number, they will also have to sit down. You continue to play until there is only one person standing.

Subtraction Bowling

Set up a toy bowling pin set (or make one from plastic bottles or toilet paper tubes). Kids bowl and see how many pins they knock down, subtracting that number from 10. Then they repeat, this time subtracting from the previous answer. First to get to zero wins!

Counting On

Remove the face cards from a deck of playing cards and grab a pair of dice. The first player turns over a card and then rolls the dice. The number on the dice indicates how far they “count on” from the card. (For example, a player turns over a three and rolls a four. They say, “Three: four, five, six, seven.”) If the player gets it right, they keep the card, and the other player(s) get a turn.

Snowball Fight

Make “snowballs” from paper (or any way you like), then place them in a bucket at one end of the room. Start kids out by having them toss snowballs into another bucket until they reach 10 (or any target number). Then, up the challenge by placing some snowballs in each bucket, and have kids figure out how many more they need to toss in to make 10.