Games for Educators

Math Concepts

Add/Subtract1,countingto11

Materials

Paper, 2 colors of markers, playing cards

Players

2

Set up

Have one shared piece of paper with house shapes marked on it from 0 to 11. To promote more interactions with the number sequence, the houses should not be laid out in order. Use a deck of cards with the face cards removed. Each player starts with seven markers of their distinctive color.

Play

On a turn, a player picks a card. The player has the option of placing a marker on a house with a number one more or one less than the number on the card. If a house has three or more of the opponent’s markers, that house is safe and the player cannot move there. If a house has one or two of the opponent’s markers, the player can send those markers back to the opponent with the phrase “Get out of my house!”

Goal

The first player to have all seven markers on the board at one time wins.

Example move

For the last move in the game above, red picked the “3” card. Red had a choice of moving to 2
or 4, and red chose to put the second marker on the 2.