You will need a deck of playing cards and paper and pencil for each group of four students for this game of practicing exponents. Shuffle the cards and lay them in the center of the table. On each player's turn, he draws two cards. One card will represent the base and one the exponent. The player tries to make the greatest amount he can be choosing carefully which number will be the base and which the exponent. In this game, aces are one, jacks are eleven, queens are twelve and kings are thirteen. One student keeps track of the totals from each round. Play continues clockwise from the first player. When the cards are gone, the player with the highest total wins.
Practice ordering integers and probability skills with this card game. Provide a deck of playing cards for each group of four students. In this game, the aces are one, the jacks are eleven, the queens are twelve, the kings are thirteen and jokers are zero. The black cards are positive integers; the red cards are negative integers. Each player is dealt three cards: two face-up and one face-down in between them. At each turn, the player predicts whether the center card will have a value that is between the other two cards. She then turns the center card over. If she is correct, she keeps all three cards. If she is incorrect, all the cards are returned to the dealer. Play continues until all the cards have been dealt or a designated time is up. The player who has the most cards wins.
Have your students choose a partner for this game. Create a deck of cards for each pair of players. Make three index cards for each of the following equations: n+2, n+3, n+4 and n+5. Write each of the following phrases on an index card: Add 2, Add 4, Add 10, Subtract 1, Subtract 3, Subtract 5 and Subtract 10. Make three index cards for each of these values for the variable "n": n=1, n=2, n=3, n=4, n=5, n=6, n=7, n=8, n=9 and n=10. Place the "Subtract," "Add" and the variable cards in a deck and shuffle them. Give each player four equation cards, a sheet of scratch paper and a pencil. Player one draws the first card in the deck. If it is a variable card, he substitutes that value for the "n" on his first equation card. The sum of the equation is the number of points the player receives. If he draws a "Subtract" or "Add" card, he deducts from or adds to his point total. He keeps track of his points on his scratch paper. The first player with 25 points wins.
Have students choose a partner for this coordinate points game. Each pair of students needs two ten-sided dice and a sheet of graph paper. On the sheet of graph paper, students draw a coordinate grid with an X-axis and a Y-axis. Each student takes turns rolling the dice. The player uses the results of her roll to plot a point on the grid. If she rolls a 4 and a 7, she can use the coordinate 4/7 or 7/4. Each player marks her coordinates with a different small shape, such as a square or star. Each spot on the grid can only contain one shape. When a player has three shapes in a row, she is the winner.