Are your students just beginning to learn about what multiplication is and how it is useful? These videos are a great place to start. These are all simple explorations of quantity with suggestions for hands-on tasks using basic materials that can be found around the house. Connections to estimation, skip counting and repeated adding are explicitly made. Why? Because multiplication is just a fancy way to count.
Fancy Counting 1: Grouping by 5’s (using bingo chips and pennies)
Fancy Counting 2: Grouping by 10’s (using dried beans and Cheerios)
Fancy Counting 3: Grouping by 2’s (using shoes and socks)
Fancy Counting 4: Complex groupings using food packets.
Fancy Counting 5: Complex groupings using Lego.
Fancy Counting 6: Practice writing equations (adding and multiplication) using dice or playing cards.
Numeracy Lab Counting Challenge! A counting routine with the following basic steps: select, sort, count and record!