One of the best ways to get our students to be thoughtful mathematicians is to give them tasks that make them develop their mathematical reasoning. Go to YouCubed.org to find meaningful games, tasks, and lots of thoughtful research on how to learn math.

 

We want our students thinking and reasoning, not just plugging in numbers and getting answers (we have calculators for that), so here are a few of my favorite open-ended tasks where your student will be challenged to do more than find an answer, but will have to do lots of thinking, reasoning, estimating, and making sense as they complete fun activities. Often, you'll find your student completing multiple addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division problems as they strategize their next move. This is much more meaningful than math facts drills and typically gets them to do more math without them even realizing it!