Last year for our Valentine’s Party, I wanted a fun game for students to play while keeping them engaged in learning. To help my students feel excited about learning while celebrating, I created a multiplication fact bingo game with a Valentine’s theme. My 4th graders loved it! It was a good review for them, and they got to celebrate the holiday together. This year, however, we are completely online. (Thank you Covid.) Because of this, I didn’t have a way to play my Valentine's math bingo game with my students.
Transitioning to Online Games
As a teacher, I love being able to incorporate learning into our holiday activities. Unfortunately, all of the fun games that I have done in the past required the physical presence of my students in my classroom. I have had to revamp many of my plans and make everything digital.
I have felt overwhelmed with all of the expectations that are placed upon me when it comes to distance learning. I felt sad because it would be harder to celebrate holidays with my students the way I was used to. My students also realized that celebrating holidays as a class would be more difficult since we weren’t together.
Using Valentine's Math Bingo in My Classroom
In order to help us have some semblance of our holiday activities, I created a digital Valentine’s math bingo game. Each student gets a digital bingo card that already has counters on it. All they have to do is drag and drop each counter onto the correct space. I share the calling cards with them through the screen share feature on Zoom.
This ended up being such a fun experience for my students. It broke up the day a little bit (we don’t play bingo games every day, so it was something new). They were also engaged in practicing their multiplication facts, which we still need in fourth grade.
Even though school looks totally different these days, I love that I have a digital version of a fun game that I was used to playing with my classes in years past. Digital games are great too because I don’t have to worry about printing, laminating, and then trying to keep track of bingo cards and counters! Even when we’re back in the classroom, I think I’m going to keep using the digital Valentine's math bingo game to celebrate together.
Want to see what my Valentine's math bingo game looks like? Check out the video below, or click HERE to see it on Teachers Pay Teachers.