Game

A copymaster of the game board is provided at the end of these notes.
This game encourages students to develop addition or subtraction strategies for combining hundreds and thousands. As they play the game, take the opportunity to discuss their thinking strategies. Questions that will encourage thinking may include “How many points do you have so far?” followed by “How did you work that out?”
Quick games like this one are ideal as independent activities, either as a practice activity or as a reward for effort in other mathematics work.
Few rules are listed for this game. This allows you to adapt the game to cater for the interests and challenge levels of your students.
Try incorporating rules such as these, singly or in combinations:
• Each player must visit at least one of each type of ship and power source.
• Throwing a double means you have been struck by a meteorite. You must miss a turn.
• You must reach a power source before you have moved 12 spaces, or you will be stranded in space without power.
• You cannot land on the space station until you have collected 1 000 points.
• You must throw an exact amount to land on an alien ship and/or on a power source.
These rules will require the students to use strategies other than dashing down the shortest route possible. The extended rules will also ensure that the game retains its interest if you want it to be a long-running feature of class or group activities.

Answers to Activity

A game of counting in 100s and 1 000s