About this game

At a glance

At a glance: a free Grade 1 math game for ages 6-7. Each round draws 5 questions; instructions are read aloud and every answer is checked and explained.

How it plays and why it helps

Counting dots one by one is exactly what this game asks your child not to do. At a glance shows a domino or a ten frame, with the instruction read aloud: no counting each dot. Your child sees the parts, puts them together and taps the total from four numbers. A round has five of the nine cards in this Grade 1 game, and every answer is checked and explained: the full row is 5, and with 3 more that makes 8 dots.

This is conceptual subitizing: seeing 6 as 2 and 4 on a domino, or 9 as a full row of five and 4 more on a ten frame. Each part is known on sight, like the face of a die, and only the joining needs thought. That is how fluent counters see amounts, in chunks rather than in ones.

Empty squares can pull the eye. On the ten frame cards, one choice counts the gaps instead of the dots: 1 for a full row and 4 more, 2 for a full row and 3. Ask, "Are we counting dots or holes?" Praise the chunking: "You saw the full row as five."

Aligned with

  • 1.NBT.A.1 Count to 120, starting at any number less than 120. In this range, read and write numerals and represent a number of objects with a written numeral.
  • 1.OA.C.5 Relate counting to addition and subtraction (e.g., by counting on 2 to add 2).

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