Review by Debbie Gorrell, Common Sense Education | Updated August 2015

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MathGames

Name: MathGames
Item: MathGames
Rating: 4
Author: Debbie Gorrell

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Fabulous free games, quiz questions address Common Core standards

Subjects & skills

Grades This grade range is a recommendation by Common Sense Education and not the developer/publisher.

Pre-K–8

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Math games offers six playable games for K-8.

Kids earn stars as they complete skills.

The games are a fun way to practice math skills.

Teachers can track progress and create assignments accordingly.

Pros: Games and interactive questions are powered by an adaptive learning system that changes to meet kids' skills and expertise.

Cons: Solutions aren't provided for incorrect answers, limiting kids' ability to learn from mistakes.

Bottom Line: A fantastic resource for practicing Common Core math skills, but struggling students won't get much support.

How Can I Teach with This Tool?

MathGames would work well as an in-class practice tool or for creating homework assignments. Assign specific games or question sets based on skill level and any progress reports based on previous assignments. The search filter makes it easy to create assignments by grade, skill, or standard.

What Is It?

MathGames includes an interactive set of games and assessment-style questions that are aligned with Common Core State Standards. Skills range from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. Parents, caregivers, and teachers can sign up for a free account by entering an email address and then adding classes and students. Kids can then access assignments by logging in with a username and password. Users can search the games and interactive questions to create assignments, and searches can be filtered by grade, skills, or CCSS. When kids log into their student accounts and complete assignments, progress reports are automatically generated.

Is It Good for Learning?

The designers of MathGames have done a fine job of creating a content-rich site packed with CCSS-aligned learning opportunities. Kids can learn math skills ranging from basic counting and number sense to algebra and statistics. The games challenge kids to apply these skills in unique settings, and the interactive questions are an excellent way to practice and prepare for assessments. Games are customized depending on a player's mastery of a skill set and level of experience. Kids can easily view their progress and identify areas of strengths and weaknesses. Feedback is brief: either positive praise or encouragement to keep trying. MathGames isn't a stand-alone instructional tool, but it's an excellent resource for supporting curriculum.

Rating Details

Overall Rating

Engagement Is the product stimulating, entertaining, and engrossing? Will kids want to return?

Action-packed games are a fun way to practice math, and interactive questions include colorful graphics and motivational feedback.

Pedagogy Is learning content seamlessly baked-in, and do kids build conceptual understanding? Is the product adaptable and empowering? Will skills transfer?

Most activities are nicely aligned to the CCSS and increase in difficulty as students master the skills. There's not much feedback for incorrect answers, but the site's meant for practice more than instruction.

Support Does the product take into account learners of varying abilities, skill levels, and learning styles? Does it address both struggling and advanced students?

Setting up a user account is easy. Instructions or a demo video could help users with more advanced procedures like creating and completing assignments.

Common Sense Reviewer

Debbie Gorrell

About our ratings and privacy evaluation.

Counting And Cardinality

K.CC.5
Count to answer “how many?” questions about as many as 20 things arranged in a line, a rectangular array, or a circle, or as many as 10 things in a scattered configuration; given a number from 1–20, count out that many objects.
K.CC.7
Compare two numbers between 1 and 10 presented as written numerals.

Geometry

4.G.3
Recognize a line of symmetry for a two-dimensional figure as a line across the figure such that the figure can be folded along the line into matching parts. Identify line-symmetric figures and draw lines of symmetry.
6.G.1
Find the area of right triangles, other triangles, special quadrilaterals, and polygons by composing into rectangles or decomposing into triangles and other shapes; apply these techniques in the context of solving real-world and mathematical problems.
6.G.2
Find the volume of a right rectangular prism with fractional edge lengths by packing it with unit cubes of the appropriate unit fraction edge lengths, and show that the volume is the same as would be found by multiplying the edge lengths of the prism. Apply the formulas V = l w h and V = b h to find volumes of right rectangular prisms with fractional edge lengths in the context of solving real-world and mathematical problems.
8.G.2
Understand that a two-dimensional figure is congruent to another if the second can be obtained from the first by a sequence of rotations, reflections, and translations; given two congruent figures, describe a sequence that exhibits the congruence between them.
8.G.7
Apply the Pythagorean Theorem to determine unknown side lengths in right triangles in real-world and mathematical problems in two and three dimensions.

Measurement And Data

5.MD.1
Convert among different-sized standard measurement units within a given measurement system (e.g., convert 5 cm to 0.05 m), and use these conversions in solving multi-step, real world problems.

Number And Operations—Fractions

5.NF.4
Apply and extend previous understandings of multiplication to multiply a fraction or whole number by a fraction.
5.NF.7
Apply and extend previous understandings of division to divide unit fractions by whole numbers and whole numbers by unit fractions.1

Operations And Algebraic Thinking

3.OA.8
Solve two-step word problems using the four operations. Represent these problems using equations with a letter standing for the unknown quantity. Assess the reasonableness of answers using mental computation and estimation strategies including rounding.3
3.OA.9
Identify arithmetic patterns (including patterns in the addition table or multiplication table), and explain them using properties of operations. For example, observe that 4 times a number is always even, and explain why 4 times a number can be decomposed into two equal addends.

Ratios And Proportional Relationships

6.RP.3.b
Solve unit rate problems including those involving unit pricing and constant speed. For example, if it took 7 hours to mow 4 lawns, then at that rate, how many lawns could be mowed in 35 hours? At what rate were lawns being mowed?
7.RP.2.c
Represent proportional relationships by equations. For example, if total cost t is proportional to the number n of items purchased at a constant price p, the relationship between the total cost and the number of items can be expressed as t = pn.

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