Educating.....and a Box of Dominoes

   I love to teach; anything, anytime, anywhere. My heartfelt desire was to engage my students in a fun and effective classroom environment reaching each learning style as we went. Having a limited budget to work with, any extra-curricular items had to be either already on hand, or relatively inexpensive.
   One thing that became invaluable to my numbers/math/arithmetic time was dominoes. One set had each number set in different colors- perfect for pre-reading/counting color recognition and matching games. As the students' skill grew so did our domino activities.
   Counting the dominoes and matching is great fun, but why stop there? Start by writing numbers on the board, draw a domino, count the dots on one side of the line, point to the corresponding number on the board; now count the number on the other side of the line and find the corresponding number. Once the students could write their numbers they wrote it on the board instead of finding them.
   We're not done yet. As addition became a part of our learning, I would set up the blackboard __+__=___. A student would draw a domino, count the dots on one side writing that number in the first blank, count the number on the other side of the line writing it in the other blank, count all the dots on the domino and write it in the answer blank. Easy, fun, check-your-self addition drills.
  My students loved domino days, often requesting we use them more often. It was so satisfying seeing children's minds, hands, eyes engaged in activities that taught them foundational skills they would need for a lifetime.
   Stay tuned next week as we share another fun, interactive and inexpensive classroom activity!