At the shop we sold a lot of dice … I mean a LOT of dice.  And we stocked a lot of different kinds of dice (some of which I will have again and offer for sale at our Game Nights.)  We even created a give-away bag of double dice for a local district’s Math Night and included ideas on how to use these dice at home!  Using dice to practice math (or word) skills instantly makes practice time much more fun!  Here’s how ….  

In case you’re not familiar with the double dice, they are large clear dice with numbers on the outside, and another die inside of them … both either 6-sided or 12-sided.  So for beginners (1st or 2nd grades), we’d suggest the 6-sided dice.  Roll one of the die and add the inside die number to the outside number.  For even younger children, have them write down the numbers that come up and decide which is greater than (>) or less than (<) the other.  As they grow in their math knowledge, roll the die and use the outside number as your tens, the inside as your ones.  Write the correct number.  Instant place value practice!  After that, roll the die again, write the second 2-digit number and then add or subtract those numbers.  Now you have double digit addition & subtraction.  For older students learning multiplication, the same basic principles may apply.  Mastered those?  Go for the 12-sided dice!  Now you’ve practice for all four functions at your fingertips!!


To make things even more interesting, we also carried 3-in-one dice … literally 3 tiny dice inside a larger clear die.  Each of the tiny dice inside are different colors (red, white, & blue to be exact!)  I loved these for place value to 3 digits, announcing before you roll that the blue are your hundreds, red your tens, and white your ones.  Write the number.  Roll again, record that number and add, subtract, multiply, or divide!


Of course, any of these practice exercises can be done with plain dice like you might find in a board game.  Roll one, roll two, roll three.  You can do it … the double & triple dice are just a bit more interesting    

 When I was in about 2nd grade, my Mom insisted I help dry the dishes as she washed.  No dishwashers then (outside of us!) and I HATED the job.  But to make the time go faster, she made up a game for us to play.  We’d take turns calling out the alphabet letters in order.  The other would have to come up with a word that began with that letter and then spell it!!!  No duplications from one game to another, and Mom always used words that were well above my reading level at the time and most times I’d have to question her on what it meant and where did she EV-er find that word!!??  So I got not only a vocabulary lesson, but spelling practice as well!  I felt sooooo intelligent using the word “debris” in 2nd grade!    It seemed so … continental!  Hahahahahaha!


Decades later when my sales rep for our dice company came into the shop and showed me Alphabet Dice, I immediately thought of our dish-duty games!  But more than just rolling the die for one letter, why not go one step further … roll it a couple of times and think of a word that incorporates both/all of the letters you’ve rolled!  Or decide that your word needs to be a certain part of speech … say it has to be an adjective and maybe instead of spelling the word, you have to use it in a sentence!  Get creative!


The point is… there are lots of opportunities for learning and practicing skills during your day.  Take advantage of those moments, create a memory, and strengthen a skill!




-Carol  


(Pictured above: Double Dice by Koplow)