Today I thought I would share with you a fun little math game that the oldest Mister and I created based on an activity I had originally done with the babycakes. For the big kids it became Muffin Tin Math! Mr. A looooves all things math. This was a HUGE hit! It could be scaled down for younger kids with simpler math facts.
I lined a muffin tin with cupcake wrappers and wrote a math problem in the bottom of each one. The object was for him to bounce the ping pong ball into one of the muffin cups and then solve the math problem.
It was not as easy as it looked to bounce those ping pong balls into the muffin cups. It was hilarious and we both had fun! He playing and I watching. It turned into a good challenge for Mom too. Trying to capture pictures of a ping pong ball in flight was no easy task. The math was great, but it eventually became more about how many different ways could he bounce the ping pong balls into the tin than it was about the math problems. He tried bouncing it forcefully and gently, hi and low. He even tried ricochetting it off walls. There was problem solving going on in more than one sense of the word.
Muffin tin math is a great activity for many different age groups. For younger kids just adjust the math problems to their level, or for even younger kids use it for pure number recognition. For the absolute youngest, just have fun bouncing the ball into the tins. If you’d like to see the original post and activity I did for the little guy you can pop on over to the kidsactivitiesblog.com and have a read.
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