Make Math More Fun--Truth Behind Making Learning Math Extra Fun

Do Not Allow Your Math Classroom To Become Too Quiet and Boring!
Find Ways to Make Math More Fun

Happy Students=Happy Teachers

I feel so strongly about creating a classroom that is educationally sound, yet is able to incorporate fun games and activities into the every day curriculum. Making math more fun is a simple and easy thing to do. These principals can be followed in all classrooms! I have copied below an article I used several times and then took the time to expand a bit on some of the suggestions. I hope you find this helpful in your quest to make math extra fun for your students.

Fun means different things to different people. It does not have to mean “play a game.” Making math more fun (or any other subject), happens when a variety of different activities are incorporated directly into daily lessons. Making learning extra fun happens when the teacher has fun in their teaching. Making a class fun does not mean make one day a special fun day. Children do not need a whole lot to create fun, something adults often forget with the mounds of toys and activities we provide for them. Children have been known to entertain themselves for an entire day with an old blanket by building fortresses and tents. Give a child of any age a beach and a shovel and endless ideas for fun happens. This article will suggest some simple but effective way to bring fun into the daily lessons.

Fun can be music. Use a favorite tune to sing the multiplication tables. Let the students choose a song and let them put some math facts to it. Allow soft music with no words to play in the background while working.
Fun can be color. Color is so simple to incorporate! Make flashcards on colored 3x5 cards. Student can learn to hilite worsheet directions in green and the answers in orange. Run printable math games and worksheets off on colored paper. Let students use colored pencil to do the math! Middle schoolers enjoy this as much as the younger ones!
Fun can be pictures. Draw a picture to illustrate a problem or set of problems. Students can find pictures in magazine that illustrate some of their homework problems, or write a math problem of their own based on a picture they find. Find a video on You Tube that illustrates a problem or helps learn a procedure.
Fun can be construction. Use Leggos as rewards for correct answers. The color and shape and size can be determined by differing attributes in each answer. The older they are the more challenging the attributes are, again middle schoolers love to play with building blocks. Jenga blocks can also be used by printing numbers on the sides of the blocks.
Fun can be throwing. A simple soft Koosh ball or bean bag can be used in oral drill; throw it back and forth to the student, teacher asks and throws, student answers and throws back. A indoor basketball hoop in the front of the class is motivation to get an answer correct and shoot. Teach a student to bounce a ball when reciting facts on their own time.
Fun can be talking with your hands. Design hand signals for vocabulary words to help memory. Create a mantra or a chant to recite them each day for memorizing steps to a procedure, adding hand movements to go with it.
Fun can be manipulating. Math classroom are full of manipulatives, use them! Many schools use fraction tiles, or attribute blocks. Anything can be cut apart and manipulated on desks and put back together. Post it notes with numbers can be used to do problems on the desk. They can be color coded them by place value!
Fun can be an unusual medium. There are special dry erase markers that will write on windows! They also can be used on many desk surfaces. Giant pencils, pencils that are straws, can be the simple thing that make the lesson enjoyable. Shaving cream, pudding or whipped cream is a messy beut extra fun way to write answers to problems!
Fun can be interesting creative games. Games of all shapes and sizes can be used in the classroom and still be part of the daily lesson! Printable math games with pencil and paper, challenging board games, large full classroom games where students get up and move around and even outdoor activities all have adaptations available to use to making learning math extra fun.
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These ideas illustrate that creating an atmosphere filled with fun for math classes can be simple but effective. It is important that the teacher incorporate these activities directly into lessons and not as a separate special activity or game time. This creates a positive attitude towards the class as a whole and eliminates the students pestering with, “Can we play a game today?” annoying questions. Eventually making math learning more fun will become second nature, incorporating the techniques as a matter of routine to classes of all ages.

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