Personal Savings Account

Score Sheet

Tom Schersten: In this video, I’m going to show a game that kids can play day after day that will give them lots of drill on place value and won’t seem like a drill, because they’re playing a game.

Kids will roll dice which will tell them how many ones to take. They will put the blocks on a game mat.

At the top of the mat it says Personal Savings Account. On the left side is a place for putting hundreds. On the right is a place for putting ones; in the middle is a place for putting tens.

We’re also going to record everything on a Score Sheet. On the left side there’s a roll column where we write down what the dice roll was. Then we have three columns to write down how many hundreds we have, how many tens we have, and how many ones we have.

On the right side is the points column–how much all three of those tallies are worth altogether.

I also have a transition tub here, because I find that, lots of times, kids mix up their new blocks with their old blocks. Any time we’re taking new blocks, we’re going to put them into the transition tub so we don’t lose them.

Also, any time you roll the die, we roll it into a plate. If it comes out of the plate, it doesn’t count, and you have to roll again. If you roll out of the plate twice in a row, you lose your turn.

I’m going to model a few turns and how to do the recording so you’ll know how to use this game.

I roll the die, and I get a 3. The first thing I’m going to do is record a + 3 in the roll column.

I’m adding in this game, so that’s why I’m putting the plus sign there. Then I put my pencil down. I go get 3 ones, put them into my transition tub, so I can count and make sure I have the right number.

I have 3. I have checked it, so now I’m putting them onto my Personal Savings Account on the right side, where we have the ones.

Now I’m picking up my pencil, and I’m just going to record how many of each kind of block I have. I don’t have any hundreds, so I’m recording a 0. I don’t have any tens, so I’m recording a 0. I have 3 ones, so I’m writing a 3, and these amount to 3 points.

Here comes the next roll of the die. It’s a 4, so I’m writing down a + 4, putting my pencil down and getting 4 new blocks, putting them into my transition tub so I can check to make sure I have the right number.

I do have 4, so I will pick them up and add them to my paper. This is where the adding occurs. We don’t have to do any adding mentally.

We’ve added the 7, and what we’re going to record now is the cumulative total. The roll column on the left records what happens on each individual turn, but everything else is a cumulative total.

At this point, I see that we have no hundreds, no tens, and now we’re up to 7 ones, and this was worth a total of 7 points. Here comes the next roll of the die.

It’s a 5. I’m writing down that I’m adding 5, and I’ll put my pencil down and go get 5 new blocks and put them into my transition tub so I can count and make sure that it’s 5.

It is, so I will bring them out onto my paper, and I see that I have enough blocks that I can trade for a 10-stick. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. I’m trading 10 ones in for a 10-stick.

Notice that I said what I was doing at the same time I did it. Research shows that when we do that, kids are more likely to remember what they did.

It’s now time to record the cumulative total that I have. I still have no hundreds. I have 1 10-stick, and I have 2 ones. When I count them up, I have 10, 11, 12. I’m recording the 12.

Next roll of the die is a 6. I’m writing down a +6, and I’m going to get 6 new blocks, and counting to make sure I have the right number in my transition tub, and I do, and so I bring them out onto the board.

Now it’s time to count what I have. Still no hundreds. I have 1 10-stick, and now I have 8 ones. This is 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 points.

We’ll take one final turn. I roll a 4. I’m writing down a 4. I’m going to get my 4 blocks, putting them in the transition tub to make sure I have the right amount. I bring them out onto my board, and I see that again I can trade for another 10-stick.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. I’m trading 10 ones in for a 10. I pick up my pencil and record what I have. I have no hundreds. I have 2 tens and 2 ones, and when I count them up I have 10, 20, 21, 22.

One of the purposes of this game is to show kids that 22 actually is 2 tens and 2 ones. All throughout this score sheet, we will see that our tallies really tell us how many we have.

If you would like copies of the Personal Savings Account game mat or the Score Sheet, please see the links below.

Personal Savings Account

Score Sheet