Who says Zero the Hero can only come the first 100 days of school? Our kids loved the math games that he was bringing them, so....if you can't beat them, join them. We found this a perfect way to introduce new games and review previously taught standards. This blog post shares how to organize and set it up as well as some of the activities from post day 100!
We kept the same bag that we had used for the first 10 visits, so no need to make a new one. Each 10th day, Zero packs the bag with a special surprise. It contains a letter from Zero the Hero as well as a new game.
The letter introduces the math concept for the new game. Here are a few of the games:
Spin and Add
To play this game, invite the kids to spin the spinner and subitize the number of fingers where the spinner lands.
To make the spinner really spin, consider adding a pony bead to the brad. This acts as a washer and gives the paper clip the room it needs to spin.
After spinning, invite the kids to color the fingers on the hands (they will spin twice). Now, write the equation and the sum!
Roll and Add
This is a super easy game. Invite the kids to roll two dice. Add the dots together, and trace the sum! Which numeral gets to the top first?
Here's another teacher hack! To keep from having sums over 10, simply cover the 6 dots to show "zero" dots!
Spin and Decompose
To play this game, invite the children to spin the 11-19 spinner. Now, using a crayon, invite the children to color in the tens frames to show the number. Write the equation below.
Make a 10
Here is another game to use with a dice. Invite the child to roll the dice. Color that many squares on the tens frame. Color the remaining squares a different color. Record your equation.
Jump and Subtract
For this game, give each child a dice and a number line Invite the children to roll a dice. Using a plastic frog or a frog clip art pictures, jump the frog down the number line to match the number on the dice. Record the equation on the recording page.
Domino Sort
To play the game, you can use real dominoes (if you have enough) or paper ones that you make. Invite the kids to cut and sort the dominoes by subitizing the sum. Glue them into the correct column on the recording page.
All of these ideas and included in this Zero the Hero Unit.
