Using Dice in the Classroom

Using Dice in the Classroom: This past week I had the privilege of presenting at the New England PreK-2 Conference in New Hampshire. The teachers were so sweet and Manchester was lovely! Anyway, one of the sessions was all about using dice in the classroom. I shared some freebies and thought you might enjoy one of them, too! Using dice in the classroom for me starts with subitizing, which is super important for young children. Subitizing is the ability to “see” a small amount of objects and know how many there are without counting. One way I work on subitizing is during my math morning meeting with flash cards. I also use math games like this one. Kids match the dots with beads on the mouse tails.

Mouse Count is a great book to use along with this activity. I printed the cards on cardstock and laminated them for durability. A hole punch to the tail and then simply add a pipe cleaner. You can get your FREEBIE on Google Docs. My kids LOVE them so much that I added them to my inventory boxes that I use during transition times and as morning work some days.

Dice Games

In addition to the mice, my kids love to play Swat It! I just googled and found subitizing flash cards and then I’ll (or someone) will call out a number and the kids “swat” a card with that number of dots.

Once we are practiced with subitizing, I add various Dice Games to my math stations. I have differentiated versions for most of the games, depending upon the skill level of my students. Here is an example of the differentiation:

Other game examples:

Dice aren’t just for math, I shared plenty of examples at the conference of how we can use them for reading, too! This game has children roll the die and then read the sight word card, if read correctly they keep the card. They place a new card on the empty square.

If you are interested in my dice games, you can find the bundle on Teachers Pay Teachers. If you don’t want to invest in the bundle, check out THESE individual packs! Want to try Doubles Aren’t Trouble? You can get it on Google Docs.