Kindergarten math is the most fun. To add (pun intended) to the fun when we learned the basics of adding and subtracting with ten frames, I set up a chocolate-chip cookie game to emphasize the skills she is learning. What could be more fun than collecting chocolate chip cookies! But this game is not just about the treats; it is about building essential math skills in a way that's interactive and enjoyable. So, grab your appetite for learning and check out my ten frame chocolate chip cookies game and other activities!
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Ten frames are great for practicing one-on-one correspondence. Ten frames provide a quick and visual way of adding numbers to and from 5, since each row of a ten frame has five spots. When one spot is missing from a row, the child can immediately see it is one less than 5. With the two rows in a ten frame, the child also gets to see, visually, how close and how far the number is, since more empty spaces mean a lower number.
We fill in the ten frame starting with the first row. Only once those five squares are filled do we add items to the second row. I made my own ten frames with three different backgrounds: a lunch box (the favorite ten frame for this game), a cookie sheet, a plate, and a cookie jar.
The game I created is all about collecting chocolate chip cookies! For each turn, a player chooses a card from the deck. Each card either adds or subtracts cookies from your ten frame. The most fun is that sometimes this means YOU take a cookie from your fellow player and sometimes they take one of yours! Other times, it is a named person (on the card), which means you get cookies from the pile (in the middle of the table) or return them to the middle of the table.
I included 1-inch circle cookies in the file, so I printed these and easily cut them out with my 1-inch circle punch. That's so much easier than trying to cut out little circles! You could also use any other thing to represent cookies, but cookies are so much more fun!
My kindergartner enjoyed playing multiple times. She'd gloat when she'd end up with more cookies than I did, and of course, we each pretended to eat them up! That's a fun way to practice adding and subtracting 1, 2, and 3.
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In addition to the game, I've made some other cookie-themed kindergarten level work. We use puzzles and clip cards to further practice the counting concepts. I like worksheets that can be used as a file folder game to practice patterns and greater-than/ less-than activities. But I also offer these practice pages in black and white so teachers or parents can use as printouts for whole classes, if necessary.
Get counting clip cards, puzzles, and worksheets (shop, TPT); the ten frame math game (shop, TPT); OR get both products in a convenient BUNDLE (shop, TPT).
Do you want to continue your cookie fun in your homeschool? Check out my favorite chocolate chip cookies recipe on my blog.
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