In the mid-1800s, Englishman John Venn invented a type of diagram to help visualize logical relationships. A Venn diagram is simply a rectangular box with circular loops in it that overlap to show how objects are related. This article describes activities with Venn diagrams that can be a fun way to sharpen students' logic skills and develop number…

The easiest way to learn anything is to make the topic or activity relevant to life. The same is true for math. If teachers clearly demonstrate the relevancy of math to everyday life, students can more easily see the purpose of learning and embracing the subject. But before teachers make math relevant, they will need to overcome one more…

"When am I ever going to use this?" This question is heard or thought in every middle-level math class across the land. Teachers struggle to apply math lessons to everyday life and make math meaningful and useful for their students. This author, too, struggled with this problem, until she read the book "Math Curse" by Jon Scieszka (Viking Books,…

A hundreds chart is a simple 10 x 10 grid with the numbers 1-100. Here, the author discusses several activities for different grade levels using the hundreds chart. The activities are: (1) Chart tour (Grades K-2); (2) Mystery number (Grades 1-3); (3) Missing numbers (Grades 1-3); (4) Multiple patterns (Grades 3-5); and (5) Least common multiples…

This column describes suggestions for daily activities in a calendar format. This month's theme is math and more. Among other things, this column features several web sites for mathematics activities.

Mathematics truly is magical, especially for students with strong number sense and algebra skills. This paper describes a variety of mathematical surprises that will capture students' interest and motivate exploration of mathematical ideas. While the tricks themselves are fascinating, push students to think about the reasons why these stunning…

This brief article describes a few entertaining math "puzzles" that are easy to use with students at any grade level and with any operation. Not only do these puzzles help provide practice with facts and operations, they are also self-checking and may lead to some interesting big ideas in algebra.

Negative numbers extend our number line and greatly simplify our calculations, but sometimes students struggle with the concepts. These fun activities will help kids to make sense of the "other half" of our number system.

As the class is learning new names and new faces at the beginning of the school year, it's the perfect time to have fun with names and learn some math concepts at the same time. This document describes examples of different number games that can be played with students.

Integrating mathematics across the curriculum offers students the opportunity to link ideas in a natural, impactive way. In this article, the author shares some interactive math activities that she used in a fourth-grade class on "Cinco de Mayo," a holiday honoring Mexican independence. These fun activities not only allowed connections to be made…

Math is about the relationship between numbers. Right answers are not the only thing to look for when examining students' work in mathematics. Looking at how children solve computation problems can give teachers insight into their thinking and help determine what math skills they already know and what they still need to learn. The author contends…

In this article, the author discusses how he incorporates children's literature into the exploration and investigation of various math topics. After doing some activities, he has found that integrating different mathematical topics after discussing books can help children make the connection to mathematics in their daily lives.

Since 1990, the January issue of "Teaching Pre K-8" has highlighted a school visit by the president of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. This article discusses Cathy Seeley's visit to a 6th grade classroom at the J. E. Pearce Middle School in Austin, Texas, where she participated in a math activity from the Connected…