Simple, classroom-tested probability activities that capture students' interest, develop critical thinking skills, and reinforce addition facts are suggested. All activities involve investigating the probabilities of the sums that come up when two dice are tossed. (MT)

Activities and manipulative materials for helping children see and understand fractions are described. (MT)

Describes a system utilizing numbered chips to teach middle graders to manipulate positive and negative integers. (SJL)

Presents new ideas for using buttons, beans, and beads as teaching manipulatives for elementary school children. The ideas include a button scavenger hunt, a button count, a cup puppet bean game, a numbers guessing game with beans in jars, and a bead stringing activity. (SM)

Discusses play and play centers for children. (Editor)

Two mathematics activities introduce elementary students to geometry, using depth, width, and height. A primary level activity involves students with sorting and classifying geometric solids and with comparing numerical quantities. The activity requires building blocks or geometric solids. An intermediate level activity teaches students about…

How to use student manipulative materials and the overhead to get student involvement with first graders. (RB)

Presents two hands-on mathematics activities for teaching K -3 students to experience fractions on a tactile level. The first uses chocolates to demonstrate that fractions can be part of a whole, can be part of a set, and are equal parts. The second has students design a classroom fraction museum with fraction exhibits designed and presented by…

Math manipulatives that are made from inexpensive, common items help students understand basic mathematics concepts. Learning activities using Cheerios, jellybeans, and clay as teaching materials are suggested. (DF)

Suggestions for easily obtainable materials to encourage children's use of language. (SP)

Suggests discovery activities in spatial awareness for elementary math, utilizing home-made geometric shapes and soma cubes. (SJL)

Presents ideas for tools useful for teaching writing in elementary school, such as carbon paper, stick-on flags, blank books, scissors, rulers, tape, stationery, postcards, card stands, clotheslines, and Polaroid cameras. Notes on materials dos and don'ts and special writing projects are included. (SM)

Index cards, masking tape, pizza shells, golf tees, and empty soda bottles can be used to make manipulative objects to be used in children's mathematics games. Twenty-two games that provide practice in number drills and problem solving are described, along with instructions for making objects needed for the games. (PP)

This planning guide for efficient use of the last weeks before school opens offers ideas for interactive hall and wall displays, a guide to self-made math manipulatives, a materials checklist, a four-week task planning countdown, and a listing of teacher resource books and other classroom materials. (SM)

Spelling activities that draw upon all of a student's senses--visual, auditory, and kinesthetic--are described. Instructions for setting up a kinesthetically based holiday center that will develop a taste for spelling and a feel for words are also given. (PP)