Winter Math Stations!

One of my personal goals this year was to make time for my students to participate in math stations to practice the skills we have learned throughout the year. With that being a goal of mine, I wanted to make my own math stations for my kids that I knew would work for them and that they would enjoy. You may have seen my 12 Fall Math Stations in a previous post and now I'm ready to share my 12 Winter Math Stations. My kids get so excited about this time of day, so I'm happy to report that I have made more time this year to fit these in! We may not get to them every day, but we do almost every day which is a huge improvement from last year. Not only do the kids enjoy these math stations, but they really get a chance to practice math skills while doing so! Win, win!! :)

Here is a peek at a few of the 12 stations that my kiddos are using right now and how we do math stations in our room.

On a pocket chart (seen below), I have the station numbers in different colors. My tables in my room are also the colors of the rainbow (minus orange since I only have five tables) so it makes organization super easy. Whatever color number they are at, that is the table color they go to with their math station. For example, if they are at station 9 they will bring their math station bag to the yellow table and begin working. The kids at station 2 and 8 (the orange stations) are my write the room math stations which obviously don't need a table. I keep all of our math stations in these drawers (seen below) and the gallon bags are labeled with the number so everything gets returned to the correct place. I call a couple numbers at a time and they come grab their bag and go to their table to get started. We only do one math station a day and I rotate the names in the pocket chart for the next day.

 

 Now for the math stations inside of those drawers...

Earmuff Mania: making ten by dressing the snowmen in two different colors of earmuffs

 

Shake & Spill Snowflakes: shake 10 snowballs and spill them on the snowflake, how many are on the snowflake and how many are off? They are able to practice combinations of 10.

 Winter Clothes - Write the Room: there are four different recording sheets to practice counting, counting on, one more/one less, and addition.

I also include answer keys for some of the math stations so that the kiddos can independently check their answers when they finish. They LOVE it!

 Penguin Craze Match: matching teen numbers to the corresponding ten frames

 Snowball Fight: each partner draws a card and whoever has the higher number keeps the cards, but there's a twist! If they draw a snowball card, they have to put all their cards back under the pile. :)

 

 Ice Fishing Draw, Say, Keep Those Shapes: students practice their 2D and 3D shapes with this game which also requires them to check their partner's answer too.

Happy Flakes: students draw a card and write the number in the snowflake on their recording sheet. Then they count on two more times from that number and record it. 

 The Height of a Snowy Night: use a snowball ruler to measure different types of winter clothes. 

 

 Roll a Snowman: this one comes in addition (use 2 dice) and regular subitizing (use 1 die). Once they roll the number, they get to draw that piece onto their snowman until it is complete.

 Chilly Addition & Subtraction. These mats are great to practice addition and subtraction. They draw a card and write the corresponding equation.

 

Also included in the pack are roll and cover games and a graphing activity with math cards and questions. As you see in the pictures, we love to use dry erase crayons instead of EXPO markers for our laminated math stations. They work awesome and erase really well without leaving residue like markers can do sometimes.

Once it's time to clean up math stations, I ring a bell and they erase, put everything back in their bag like they received it, and put it back in the drawers. They are little rock stars at this by now and it works great! 

You can get these math stations here if you liked what you saw! 

I will soon be making some spring math stations too so there will be stations for fall, winter, and spring that are all aligned to the Common Core Standards! Stay tuned! :)