Dots and Boxes

Tonight we had a friend’s kids over as well as ours, so our place was kind of a mad house. A colleague had recently shown me the book The Dots and Boxes Game by Elwyn Berlekamp I had read about the first chapter and was intrigued, so I wanted to introduce the game to my kids. as the night was about to descend into total chaos I called everyone to the table and gave them the run-down on how to play the dots and boxes game: start with a grid of dots. On your turn connect any two adjacent dots. If you complete one or more little squares (a box) initial the box and go again. The three-year-olds basically scribbled. The five- through eight-year-olds played a few games and moved on to something else, but my ten-year-old eventually decided to challenge me. I played against him enough times for him to see me use, and then learn to use himself the double-cross tactic (which is explained in the dots and boxes Wikipedia article).

Anyway, we’ll probably continue to have fun with dots and boxes. Something else that I wanted to set them loose on is the following game that I first heard of from Singing Banana:

But we didn’t get around to it tonight…

Puzzles with Japanese Names

Here are some of my favorite puzzles that happen to have Japanese names:

Sudoku.  Sudoku is so popular that my readers have almost certainly heard of it.  Here are some unconventional versions:  Math Games: Sudoku Variations.

Tentaizu.  A good example and explanation is found at this blog: y of x (the puzzle originally comes from Southwest’s in-flight magazine).

Kenken.  The Wikipedia article gives the history, rules and some sample puzzles: Kenken on Wikipedia.

Kakuro.  I’ll refer you to Wikipedia for this one also: Kakuro on Wikipedia.

Takegaki.  Those geniuses who write the puzzles for Southwest Airlines have done it again:  Southwest Magazine Takegaki.

Thanks go to Evelyn for pointing me to the last one, and for reminding me of this post that had been sitting in my draft-box for months.

Math Card Games

By Joan A. Cotter, Ph.D. Published by Activities for Learning, Inc.  A link to their site about this product can be found here: Math Card Games: 300 Games for Learning and Enjoying Math.  To see a price list, click on the picture at the bottom of the page.

These games are designed to assist in the memorization of mathematical facts and the reinforcement of concepts by practice, but in a way that makes the players think a little more than doing a worksheet, and is a lot more fun and interactive.  The games tend to remove many of the boring aspects of learning elementary level math.

Games cover the following subjects: Numeration, Addition, Clocks, Multiplication, Money, Subtraction, Division, and Fractions.

Many of the games are memory games, with a twist.  The twist is where the genius comes in.  The game that I played today with my oldest was designed to assist him in learning the dreaded times tables.  In this game, number cards with multiples of chosen numbers on them are used, and the twist is that instead of getting matches, you have to find the cards in increasing order.  If you are looking for multiples of 3, and turn over 6 first, you can’t take it, you have to find the 3 first.  The great part about it is that the after you find the 3-card, your mind turns to finding the 6-card, after that you are looking for the 9-card, etc.  Your mind begins to anticipate what the next number is as you play.  After playing the game multiple times, you become familiar with the number sequences.

Many of the games are modified versions of common games, such as fish and rummy, so it makes it easy for the child to play them.  The rest have pretty simple rules that the child can easily understand.  Several of the games can be played with multiple players, or as solitaire games.

This book and the accompanying cards have been well worth the money, and we’ve have 270+ more games to go in the book.

Reviewed by Arlynda