Viva Las Vegas

My husband spent weekend on a guys weekend in Vegas with his buddies from law school and the kids have been fascinated with what Daddy and his friends are doing. What better time to work on math!!

I get out the poker chips, regular cards, Uno cards, and Bingo cards and we get to work playing at our own Vegas GIRLS weekend.

Abby after a sweet victory!

(And why not polar bear ears – we’re in Vegas)

Value

Card games are full of math and logic components. Add betting to the mix and you are really enhancing the learning…and the fun.

First we talk about what value means. Value means how important something is to you or how much you can get for it if you trade it. Then we reinforce our understanding of currency – which has more value, a dollar or a quarter? A quarter or a dime? A nickel or a penny?

These poker chips have value too. The white ones have the least value. The red ones have the most. They are worth 3 white ones. The blue ones are worth 2 white ones. I make sure the kids understand the red ones are the ones you want to get more of or keep and the white ones have the lowest value.

Everyone gets 10 white chips, 5 blue chips and 2 red chips.

Then I explain how betting and our game works. I get the Spiderman playing cards out. No one wants to play with Spidey cards. Ok, we can play with the colorful Uno cards instead. I adjust the rules in my head and explain them.

The rules:

Everyone look at the card on top of your pile, but don't show it to anyone. The cards go from one to ten. One is worth the least and the ones with writing are worth the most. So look at your card. If you want to play you have to put a white chip in the pot. Then we bet. If you think you have a big card you should bet more money. If you don’t you should bet just a little or quit for that round. Or you could try to trick everyone else into thinking you have a big card by betting a lot. When we’re all finished betting, we will turn over our cards and whoever has the highest card gets that pot.

The good thing about the game is that not only are the kids thinking about the value of their chips, they are also recognizing numbers and associating the numbers on the cards to values and ranking them into least and most valuable (rote counting and 1-1 correspondence – knowing that the number 2 corresponds to 2 physical cards).

As my husband would say, I’m also teaching them greed. Hey, I want our kids to know everything, so why not greed! 

After a practice round, the kids get it and we play.

Betting becomes serious business and Briana inspects everyone’s chips every time to count and make sure we all put in what we were supposed to put in.

It’s funny to see the kids personalities. Abby is totally willing to go all in or toss in a red one for fun. Briana on the other hand really has to like her card to touch a blue chip. As a result, she folds a lot and Abby’s pile grows. Hence the happy picture at the beginning of this blog. We have a few moments to work on sportsmanship, but for the most part we all have a blast playing ‘Vegas cards’.

We try to work on adding a little too, so for a couple of rounds towards the end we modify the rules so you can add one card to your card to increase the value before you bet.

1-1 Correspondence

The other thing that we work on is dealing the cards. Making bridges takes good hand to eye coordination as does the shove-the-cards-into-the-stack kiddie shuffling. Dealing  works on hand-to-eye coordination, but also works on counting and 1-1 correspondence especially for Abby (because she’s younger and is getting the hang of that 1-1 thing for larger numbers like dealing 10 cards).

Dealing is serious business too. There are lots of recounts to make sure no one is cheated.

  

Large Number Recognition

Then, when the kids are still excited about the Girls Vegas night but bored of Uno cards and poker chips, I pull out my Bingo cards. I’ve had these cards for probably ten years and have never used them. I get them out now because they go from 1-100 and I think it’s a great way to give the kids practice recognizing big numbers.

The kids and I each get two Bingo cards and the regular Bingo rules are explained. I look over their cards and randomly pick a number that at least one of them has and watch them scour their cards for the number.

They want turns to say the number loudly and in a faux, booming, deep voice (why do kids bring out the needless theatrics in me? J ), so I start to let them pick numbers between 1 and 100, thinking that at 3 and 5 they wouldn’t figure out how to cheat and pick numbers they need that their sister doesn’t. I underestimate the kiddies. They quickly pick up the strategy, but the game is still fun since we all take turns. The best part is hearing them help each other out by breaking down a number, like Abby asking, “Briana is twenty-three a 2 then a 3 or a 3 then a 2.” And Briana answering “It’s a 2 then a 3. 3 then 2 is thirty-two.” “Oh yeah yeah. I know that.” Abby replies.

A great little Vegas night for the girls! See, you could’ve just stayed home, Daddy. I’m kidding. You have all of the fun in the world working on your math skills with your friends. J

<3 Pedigreed Housewife