I don’t know about you, but this has been the most challenging year of my teaching career! We’ve still got a week or so to go but I can already picture myself laying in the backyard, reading a book, watching my kids play (or argue…things change quickly at our house) and enjoying a much deserved break. However, we’ve still got to make it to the finish line. But how? You’ve been working hard to change your students’ math mindsets all year so let’s finish it with some end of year math games.
1. SKUNK
The game of SKUNK is my all-time favourite end of year math game. Hands down. It could be the joy that comes along with watching those risk-taking students lose all their points but it’s hard to say.
- Set up game board as shown below and have all students stand up.
- Teacher rolls a pair of dice and students record the total in the S column.
- After each roll, students decide whether they will stay standing or sit out for the rest of the round.
- If a one is rolled the students still standing lose all their points for that round.
- If double ones are rolled then students still standing lose all the points in the previous rounds, too!
- Once there are no students left standing you move on to the next column (K).
- Continue until you make it to the final column!
2. 5x5 Game
Sara Vanderwerf has tons of great ideas for end of year math games. Check out her site as she often has free Jamboard files for her games, including this one!
Materials: 5×5 grid, writing tool, deck of cards (face cards removed)
Instructions:
- Tell students that the goal of the game is to get the largest total.
- Randomly draw 25 cards, one at a time, and call out each number. The students will place the number somewhere on their grid. They cannot change the position of the number.
- Once the board has been filled up, look at every row and column to find places where the same number is in adjacent boxes. If there are 2 sixes beside each other in the same row the score for that row would be 12. If there are 3 eights beside each other that score would be 24.
- Once you’ve totaled all the rows, total each column.
- Add up the total of each row and column for a grand total.
3. To the Stars!
This end of year math game can be played in groups, pairs or even alone.
Objective: Remove all the playing cards before the five points on the star are coloured in
Materials: Deck of cards (Aces-6 only), 1 die, paper with a star on it, writing utensil
Instructions:
- Students build a 6×4 grid with all the cards facing up.
- One player rolls the die and students work together to take away a card or cards that would equal the value on the die. For example, if a 6 was rolled, players could take away a 2 and a 4 or just a 6 or any other combination that equals 6.
- If they cannot remove any cards, one point of the star is coloured in.
- The game continues until all the cards have been removed or all the points on the star are coloured in.
4. Traffic Lights
This is a partner game that you can easily turn digital if necessary – think tic-tac-toe but with a 3×3 grid
Objective: Get three chips of the same colour in a row
Materials: 3 colours of counters (red, yellow, green), 3×3 grid
Instructions:
Review the rules for placing chips:
- Red chips can be placed on empty squares
- Replace red chips with yellow chips
- Replace yellow chips with green chips
To win, student will need to get three chips of the same colour in a row, column, or diagonal
The title of this post is end of year math games, but really, you can use them any time of the year! Considering playing some at the beginning of the school year to build a love of math. Look at this post for 8 days of activities that will help you to foster a growth mindset in math.
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I’m Lauren, from “From Math to Music” – your go-to person for all things Math and Classroom Community!
Being a middle-school teacher and a mom of 3, I know how hard it is for busy teachers to create resources that allow for deep thinking and build classroom community. That's why I love sharing tips and tricks that you can you use in your middle school classroom right this minute.
