25 Math Games for Kids

Home » Montessori at Home » 25 Math Games for Kids

While I’m a huge fan of hands-on math using Montessori Materials, sometimes it’s just a bit of fun to use math games or math activities to get kids excited about math!

25 Math Games for Kids - get kids excited about learning new math concepts with 25 math activities for kids!

Hands-on Math Games for Kids

Children develop real interests often when something fascinates them, challenges them just the right amount, and they discover they are pretty good at something. Using a math game can make learning fun, creating positive associations with math processes and numbers and allow children to see real-world representations of math concepts.

1. Buggy and Buddy have so many cute book activity ideas! We love this DIY shape recognition and counting game based on the Pete the Cat & His Four Groovy Buttons book.

2. The Measured Mom is a treasure trove of printables, including this fun colouring race and suggests a few ways to play for different children. Buggy and Buddy have a similar painting activity here.

3. What about counting watermelon seeds with Watermelon Play Dough for a sensory bonus.

4. Learn Play Imagine shares the delicious idea to practice skip counting with some candy, and her son also took the opportunity to form numbers out of M&Ms!

5. Learning2Walk (who provides the free CVC printables for our series) has three free math game printables, for shape recognition, graphing, and a math board game. Laminate the printables to get more use out of them.

25 Math Games for Kids! Teach math with these hands-on math activities sure to engage even the most reluctant math student

6. Any card game can be a great introduction to numbers. I like Crazy Eights or Uno for kids.

7. I love mixing sensory activities for kids in with other subjects, so this Play Dough Math activity from Simple Learning for Kids is right up my alley.

8. How cute is this Spring Lambs counting activity from Adventures of Adam? My daughter is obsessed with Shawn the Sheep, but I immediately think of counting sheep for bedtime… although this might make that too fun!

9. A magnetic fishing game has been on my DIY-to-do list forever, and I’m feeling more motivated after seeing this math magnetic fishing game from Messy Little Monster and this one from Buggy and Buddy. (You can also buy a set.)

10. I love spending only a few minutes setting up an activity that the kids get tons of use and learning from — which is exactly what this cute mailbox set-up from Arts and Crackers offers! Letters, numbers, shapes, colours, and simple equations… the possibilities for this invitation to learn are endless!

An amazing collection of 25 Math Games for kids! There are so many great ideas for teaching math in here, especially for hands-on learning

Easy Homemade Math Games

11. Play dough subtraction smash — doesn’t that just sound fun?! A great math activity from Mama Papa Bubba.

12. Similar to their play dough idea, Mama Papa Bubba also have this fun berry subtraction idea, with a special twist on how the subtracting is done…

13.  The Sum Swamp board game uses addition and subtraction to allow players to progress in the game.

14. Magnets and dice provide some fine motor practice for this free dice game from Measured Mom.

15. Help children understand different representations of numbers and practice number recognition with this dice game from Danya Banya.

25 Math Games for Kids - so many hands-on math activities that kids will love

16. Modern Preschool generously shares these watermelon counting cards to be used with some play dough, although you could easily substitute beans or laminate them and draw the seeds on (and wipe them off after).

17. A fun twist on practicing equations, Left Brain Craft Brain made some DIY math scratch cards.

18. Gather some bottle caps and print off this free printable from Messy Little Monster for some ladybug-inspired summer math.

19. Or, if your child would prefer to play with some Lego, check out this Lego addition activity from Mama Papa Bubba.

25 Math Games for Kids - this post has some amazing ideas for hands-on learning to get kids excited about learning math

20. Another math activity based on a book, Buggy and Buddy got their inspiration for this creative counting activity from Dr. Seuss’s Apples on Top book. (Image below)

21. A waterbead sensory bin turns into a Shark Math activity with the addition of some free printables from Living Montessori Now.

22. Another math activity using bottle caps, Learn with Play at Home shared a series of math activities from a simple bottle cap picture.

23. Estimation jars are a fabulous way to enthrall and capture children’s imaginations while reinforcing a basic math skill that is often overlooked.

24. What about a life-sized math board game? Coffee Cups and Crayons shares a quick and easy set-up for some gross motor math!

25. Simply playing hopscotch like we did in 7 Indoor Bean Bag Games is a great number recognition activity, and you can mix things up by calling out a simple equation and encouraging children to jump on the answer (sum).

 

What are your favourite math games for kids?

If you liked this post, be sure to pin it for later and please consider subscribing to my free weekly newsletter for more hands-on learning ideas, parenting inspiration, and recipes!

Similar Posts

13 Comments

  1. Thank you for this wrap up! My littlest one is struggling with maths at the moment and I am struggling with ways to keep her interested! Having suffered from a terrible maths block throughout my schooling, I really don’t want her to develop one too. I’ll give some of these ideas a go. x

    1. I hope some of them help! I’m seeing my daughter go through some of my own struggles (mostly stubbornness and fear of failure) and it’s a scary place to be. Hang in there, mama.

  2. What a wonderful list of hands on math ideas. I am always on the look out for new hands on math ideas. I know how much of a difference having kids learn through fun hands on ways makes a HUGE difference. I am pinning for future reference, Thanks so much for sharing!! Have a blessed Thanksgiving!!

  3. As said before this is a treasure trove of math games Thank you. ?

    Presenting math though educational games encourages students to learn and master it.

    I have developed a free mobile math game for both Android and iOS called “Numbers Planet”. It is a collection of many math games and number puzzles for kids and adults.

    You can find it here on my blog:
    https://ganaysa.blogspot.com/2019/01/numbers-planet-games-and-puzzles.html

    I hope you like it.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.