Involving math with fun games and group activities binds up the students during class. It allows learning and trying new things with peers. The subject Maths is based on problem-solving subject to a few rules and concepts, which once understood well will work for you forever.
Providing students with textbook questions and asking them to solve is a very subjective way of the teaching-learning process. When students get involved in group activities, it leads to discussion and makes them learn efficiently. This leads to a healthy discussion, adapts problem-solving exercise and generates a child’s interest.
Further, in this article, an explanation about the necessity for an individual to start group math activity is presented, and latter will discuss a few ways of making math solving in group fun activity for all.
Solo learning vs Group Learning
Application-based math with real-world examples is the best way to excel in the subject. Being in the atmosphere of individual learning, one lacks the advantage of the contradiction of arguments or learning and trying the same problem with different techniques.
Involvement with others in the group for problem-solving activity provides a platform for expressing their ideas and comparing with others. Understanding the topic in a group is more effective as the multiple arguments that emerge from the group make others think differently.
Generally, students like to talk, so an activity where they would put their opinions, arguments, and compare to other students' arguments and mutual understanding builds teamwork quality.
Group Math as Fun
Activities involving worksheets, debates, quizzes, block games etc.where the math concepts are presented to students make learning more fruitful.
Kids always like to interact with their peers, share their thoughts, and in the group activity, this activity is self-involved. The kids' must be motivated to be part of the fun activity.
Elementary class math is basically the building block of Maths. Application-based questions, including, concepts of daily life calculations, need to be framed. Activities that start with a simple problem (addition, subtraction, numbering etc.) and involve different objectives to the problem as the activity progresses create an ambience where fun is involved and problem–solving. In the next section, few exercises are prescribed to perform in groups.
Including interesting examples, conducting meaningful math talks, presenting real objects about topics, shaping the routine to tune the students will make the learning more fun.
Group math game activities
Few activities which could be conducted in a group to make math fun are :
1. Start Round of Initials
Game of initials is a game to be played in a group yet to fulfil the individual goals.
A sheet of problems associated with a common topic or relatable topic, i.e. math in the worksheet form is prepared, and it is to be distributed among students. Now, the trick is that instead of their own papers, students are asked to approach others and fill the answer keys of their peers. This gives them to face more and a variety of questions.
So, everyone gets to interact with others and in this form, while learning the multiple questions, they also help others.
2. Math's Baseball
This game is based on dividing the class into two teams and generating a competition between them.
To play a math baseball game, the "at bat" team is asked to answer the questions framed by the teacher and ranked according to one, two or three bases based on the question's difficulty level.
The defending team pitches the question, and the 'at-bat' team is required to answer the questions and get scores based on their level of bases selected if the team answers the questions correctly.
Now if the 'at-bat' side team cannot answer or answer incorrectly, the other side team could answer the question correctly and earn-out their score. Once the team is unable to answer 3 questions in a series, they have to switch sides.
A limit of a score of 10 or upto desirable count could be set to end the game and declare the winner.
3. Game of Around the Block
It's a minds-on activity conducted among the group of students.
The students are made to stand in a circle, and then the ball is made to hold by the student. Now the teacher raises the question framed for the students. The kid holding the balm starts transferring the ball to their other classmates standing next to them clockwise. The student who started is required to answer the question before the ball reaches back to him.
In case of success, he or she chooses the next contestant, whereas he passes the ball to his next standing classmate in case of failure. In this game, the control and level of questions to be asked depends on the teacher.
4. Math Tic-Tac-Toe
Tic-Tac-Toe is one of the popular games among students, and it could be played in class between pairs.
Each pair competes against each other, where they get to learn about math skills and also get involved in mental training.
The sheet is divided into 9 different square blocks with 3 horizontal and 3 vertical lines. The students are asked to fill X and O by taking chances one after another. One who makes the pattern of 3 in a link of their selected numeric term (X or Y); he or she is declared as the winner.
5. Modify a Classic Card Game
Modifying the Card (War) game, with a twist to make students’ learning and application of basic concepts to be involved in the game.
Grouping is done in pairs among class students, and among each pair, each one takes two cards from decks of cards. Every card has a value attached to it as specified in the table.
Ace
2 to 10
Jack
Queen
King
1
Face Value
11
12
13
Based on the level of students, the activities with the number obtained can be conducted. Two cards picked by each participant could be asked to sum up or multiply, and then the student who gets the higher number is the winner and takes all the four cards.
6. Math Goodies
Lessons framed in a way to present students with interactive lessons, quizzes and appealing content-driven questions to engage students to try them.
Custom worksheets can be created for individual students, and students should be made to solve it in groups while interacting with their peers.
Discussion about the questions and concepts should be done and you must ensure it. Website contents could also be used to ask students to visit there and answer questions based on the activity mentioned in the sites.
7. One-Meter Dash
This game can be used to train students for fundamental topics like measurements. The students are divided into groups, and then they are handed over the meter sticks.
They are asked to roam around and pick up one or two things in the room and use the meter stick to estimate the length of the item compared to the meter stick and form a note to submit.
At last, the objects are measured for the exact length of the object and then it is matched to the estimated value of the student to look how close the teams were able to guess. This task’s difficulty should be based on students' capability and this will help them learn better.
8. Run Think-pair-share Exercises
This is an activity where students are asked to share their ideas and findings of their topic with others.
Teacher divides the class into pairs, and an exercise is presented to each of the pairs. The learning process of thinking, pairing and sharing is conducted as a quick review in this game. The students present their analysis about the topics for which they get a chance to conceptually think about the topics and on sharing ideas with their pair where they argue about his points and correct them.
Conclusion
Multiple activities/approaches could be taken to make students exercise on various math topics. Making classes and groups involved for fun and learning experience would be exciting. Making the sessions interactive and useful is the primary objective of the guide/tutor or teachers. Teachers must try to introduce innovative ways and playful activities to set up a benchmark for every individual student, this would help your students learn and progress quickly. Learning with fun games of a subject like Math would make your concepts last longer. Get Better at math with Cuemath games where you get a well-defined, structured way to experience learning and to get involved in activities with other students. If you use any of these tips to make your classes interesting, do let us know. Get a free trial and start exploring!