Family game night is an absolute favorite in our house! As my children grow up, we're always looking for new and interesting games that are not only fun but also challenging at the same time. I love brainteasers and anything that forces players to think about problems in different ways.
Playing math games with kids allows them to look at numbers and math concepts in different ways. It encourages them to think flexibly about numbers and build her number sense while having a good time. You can use these games to help your child increase her mental math skills, which in turn allows her to solve problems mentally (and not always with a pencil and paper on hand!). The more kids play math games, the more they become fluid math thinkers.
These five games focus specifically on mathematical concepts and can be played at different levels to accommodate the ages of your own family members.
1. Mathable: Strengthen your child's math skills with this arithmetic twist on Scrabble. Create different mathematical equations with wooden tiles to be the high scorer. You and your child can create addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division equations to get the greatest answer. This game can be played with up to four players and is appropriate for ages 8 and up.
2. Sequence Numbers: Test your child's addition and subtraction skills by solving equations on individual cards and placing your chips on the board. Get five chips in a row to acquire a sequence. Groups of numbers are color-coded to help with number recognition. Your child can improve his adding and subtracting skills when playing this interactive game, which is appropriate for ages 7 and up, and can be played with three to six players.
3. Prime Climb: In this game, your child will roll dice to add, subtract, multiply, and divide her way to the center of a colorful board. Along the way, she can pick up Prime Cards to bump opponents back to the start as they race to get to the 101th space! There is also a twist with the colorful board that will help your child see connections between numbers, and finding factors and multiples. This game can be played with two to four players and is best for players age 10 and up.
4. Tri-Ominos Game: A fun spin on the traditional domino game using triangular dominoes. Your child's points are scored by matching numbers on the three-sided tiles. He will learn to match numbers and find the tri-omino with the greatest sum. Each family member can keep score to see who is the first to 400. Perfect for two to four players ages 8 and up.
5. Farkle: In this classic dice-rolling game, the more players roll, the higher they score...but do they want to risk it all? Each family member must calculate their points and decide whether to risk them all by continuing to roll. Farkle is a fast-moving game that involves adding points and knowing when to risk it all. This is a great group game (for two or more players) that's appropriate for ages 8 and up.
I have played all of these games in my math class and my students love them! They don’t even realize how much math they are doing and how their math skills are considerably growing every time they play these games. Consider adding these mathematical twists to your family game night selections.
