Uncommonly Creative Math for Girls
Math circles are vibrant, playful math groups that help girls fall in love with math through patterns and discovery, fun projects, hands-on explorations, and games. We believe girls connect with math the most when they are having fun and experiencing math in real-life contexts. Previous math circle girls have explored math with actual kittens (I’m a kitten foster mom), or by creating and selling chocolates from their own imaginary chocolate shop.
She’s just five minutes into playing the Numbaroll place value game, and she feels like she’s just won the lottery. She turns over her last card, throws her hands dramatically in the air and yells: “Three MILLION, four hundred fifty-six THOUSAND, two hundred twenty-nine! Oh yeah! Oh yeah!” “Hey mom! I just won THREE MILLION points!”Reading and writing big numbers is one of those things adults think is easy, but is tricky
Teaching times tables to your kid can feel utterly overwhelming. I just got this message from a parent today. Sound familiar? Yeah. It sucks…and your child is just as frustrated as you are. I hate to break it to you, but she’s got 144 of the little buggers to memorize. A HUNDRED AND FORTY FOUR. How does a parent even begin? Flash cards? Pop quizzes at the dinner table? If
Your daughter is a math girl. She just might not know it yet. She may be convinced she’s bad at math, but she actually has a hidden math superpower: her unique blend of strengths, skills, interests, and inclinations that determine how she learns math best. When girls struggle with math, don’t answer “fast enough”, or just plain don’t like it, they often say they’re bad at math. But there are many
Your girls are going to love this math bingo game sooooo much! I was amazed by how popular this game was with kids, right out of the gate. Girls were literally jumping out of their seats with excitement as they called out complicated math equations. To be clear, these were the same girls who’d had a rather cringing relationship with math just a few months before. One very polite little
Your beautiful, gap-toothed 6-year-old daughter comes home crying from school one day, saying she’s bad at math. She’s only 6 years old! She’s barely been in school long enough to know what math even is, and already she’s decided she’s bad at it? How is that even possible?! 4th-5th grade used to be the danger age for girls deciding they’re bad at math, but this scenario is starting earlier and
If you’ve got a tree-hugging kid who adores the great outdoors, she’s gonna LOVE the math of finding fractal patterns in nature. Fractals are one of the coolest ways to show a connection between math and the real world. Once she knows what to look for, your girl will start looking for math everywhere! What the heck is a fractal? Think of fractals as the Russian dolls of nature. A
Clumsy Thief is a cartoony, wildly addictive addition game for kids ages 7-11. I’ll be straight up with you: Clumsy Thief can get loud. You may also have to deal with weeks of kids begging, “PLEASE can we play Clumsy Thief? Pleeeeeaaaase??” Which, you know, there are worse things than your kid begging to play a math game. But I can pretty much guarantee you that your kid will come
Here’s a real-life subtracting money game that kids play with actual cash! Which means, of course, that even though there’s a ton of math learning going on, this game doesn’t feel math-y at all. Kids love playing because they get to dig their fingers into actual money (mwa-ha-ha!) and get paid by their opponent. What’s not to like? Meanwhile, you’ll be smugly watching your child get better at counting and subtracting
I came up with this fun perimeter game for kids after I had this conversation with a 4th grader: ME: What’s perimeter? 4th GRADER: It’s where when two sides are the same, then you um, I mean you times them by two. ME: Ok…I see where you’re going with that. But what does it mean, the perimeter of something? 4th GRADER: I know, but I can’t really explain it. This girl had
Caroline Diarte Edwards
Stacey Low
Janelle Thompson
Ephi Lu
Heather Carvill
Kimberley Cashin
Marjel Sheuer
Stephanie Tuxen Bisgaard
