Math Game: Math Soup
Goal: to make a delicious math soup!
Materials: multi-colored manipulatives, bowl
How to play: write down a simple recipe for your child to follow. For example, my recipe was 4 reds, 4 white and 7 blue chips. Your child then reads the recipe and cooks up the soup for you to enjoy.
This was a very spontaneous game. We had just finished playing Math Trade, her favorite game which I discussed in an earlier post, and we had all of our poker chips lying on the table. She wasn’t quite done playing so Penny announced that she was going to cook some supper. She also announced that she was going to write down some recipes to follow. I just thought it would be neat to have her follow a “math” recipe to make me a delicious dish. She was a bit confused at first, but she was able to read the entire recipe and the feast was enjoyed by all.
At this stage the astute reader will notice that there isn’t much math involved in this repast at all. Well, this time I just put a simple number down for her to follow, as we had just finished two straight Math Trades, and so didn’t want to get burned out. This game is easy to modify, however, to include all sorts of math-related skills; for instance, each recipe could have been a simple addition or subtraction equation for her to solve. The beauty of a lot of the simple games that can be played between child and parent is that they can be make more difficult or more simple, easier or harder, quite simply. This allows you to grow with your child as she grows more adept in the basic math skills, and more confident in her ability to tackle areas just beyond her understanding. This is a key point as my experience has taught me that Penny’s willingness to attempt a novel math concept in large part is contingent upon her recent level of success in any of the math games we’ve recently played. More recent success leads to greater willingness to accept challenges. Thus the games that allow for modification allow for more instances of possible usage. It might sound technical, but the parent is typically good at reading their child, and cranking up or backing off at the right time can go a long ways toward keeping your child’s interest piqued and her learning on track.
