Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Who Has? Decks

Once students have developed conceptual understanding of the basic operations they need to develop fluency with the facts.   One quick way to include daily practice and motivate students to master these basic facts is through the use of the Who Has? card decks.   These decks can be created for virtually any topic and frequent use as both a whole class practice or as a center activity for partners or small groups will provide facts practice in a highly-motivating format. 

Mathwire houses a math Who Has? collection that includes addition, subtraction, more/less, base ten, multiplication, coins, algebra, geometry, fractions and decimals.  Each file is formatted to print on 2x4 inch labels that may be affixed to index cards to easily create classroom card decks.  Use different colored index cards for different decks.

These Who Has? (or looping, as some sites call them) decks are popular with students and teachers.  Students enjoy the game, rehearsing their card as they wait for the clue.  Teachers find it particularly efficient because students mentally rehearse 20-30 different math facts throughout the course of the game.  Teachers who time the activity find that almost no students opt out once they read their cards.  Interestingly, they continue to practice the facts, tied in to the whole class performance for that round.

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