Adding 3 Numbers

Gosh I love math. I loved learning it in school and I LOVE teaching it!! Especially when lessons just work. This week we tackled 3 digit addition which is always a tough concept. When we came to this lesson I had flashbacks to beating my head against the wall last year trying to get my kids to understand so I decided to go hands on and made these math mats.

I had them use 3 different colors to represent each part. It really helped them understand that they were combining 2 parts and then adding the third one.  (They also really loved sorting all their cubes into colors at their tables. One of my little boys just burst out "Oh I just LOVE sorting!!" haha). So first I gave them a problem and they set up their mat.

Next they chose 2 parts to combine, and wrote the number sentence on the bottom to represent the 2 parts they were adding next.

We did a few problems together and then I let them break out the dice. They rolled 3 dice, set up the problem and then went from there. The rolling of the dice instantly made it feel like a game and they were happily practicing for a good long time.

By the time we moved on to paper and pencil practice there were no tears (from me OR them), I didn't have 26 hands shooting up in the air, and pretty much everyone knocked it out in no time. Like I said I love math :)

You can download the mat here.

HAPPY FRIDAY FRIENDS!! :) I hope yall have a great weekend!!