Tug of War with a Difference

This simple maths game started out as a number line activity.

Basically, it gives children the opportunities to practice calculating differences between small numbers. It's ideal for Reception or Y1, but the basic concept can also be adjusted to suit older children.

Children work in pairs with one gameboard, a set of dominoes and one counter between them.

The maths gameboard features two mathstick characters playing tug of war, the rope between them is marked out into 20 different sectors. The centre marker is clearly larger than the others, this is the starting point. The children place a counter on this marker.

One child chooses to play red, let's say that's Rosie. The other player, Billy, chooses to play Blue. The aim of the game is to get the counter into the hands of the mathstick character, so Rosie is aiming to move the counter towards the red character while Billy wants to move the counter towards the stick man dressed in Blue.

The dominoes are spread out face-down between the players and shuffled. Red goes first, so Rosie chooses a domino and places it at the feet of her character. Now comes the simple calculation, Rosie looks at her domino (a 1,3 spot) and works out that the difference between the two sets of spots is 2. She moves the counter 2 markers closer to her red man.

The domino is placed aside, and it is now Billy's go, he turns up a 0,5 domino, he quickly works out that the difference is 5, so moves the counter back 5 places towards his Blue man.

The game continues until one player manages to get the counter into the hands of their stick figure. If all of the dominoes are used up before that happens the winner is the person who has the counter closest to their figure when the dominoes run out.

One way of adapting this maths game is to use digit cards instead of dominoes, with the children selecting two cards on their go. For this to be successful the children need to be able to confidently recognise the numerals since they will not be able to rely on a pattern of dots to support their calculation. This does mean, however that the game can be used with more able or older children. Digit cards featuring the numbers 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20 for example, would present more of a challenge while keeping the game interesting.

Finally, a number of people have used the game board as a score board for other games. Moving the counter towards the winning side - after ten games, the champion player is the one with the counter closest to their mathstick figure.

The download is a two-page A4 pdf, it includes two full-colour, high-quality baseboards and full instructions.

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